


Purposefully Silent

by OritheReticent



Category: Scooby Doo - All Media Types, Scooby Doo! Mystery Incorporated (Cartoon 2010)
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Au where Ricky doesn't spend the 1st season hiding in a lair, F/M, Fluff, Light Angst
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-10
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-02 21:54:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 28,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24113872
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OritheReticent/pseuds/OritheReticent
Summary: Au where the mystery inc kids meet Mr E as Angel's boyfriend who doesn’t talk.When Cassidy and Ricky run into Daphne at a restaurant, Ricky can't talk without risking revealing himself as Mr E.
Relationships: Angel Dynamite | Cassidy Williams/Mr. E | Ricky Owens, Daphne Blake/Fred Jones, Ricky Owens/Cassidy Williams
Comments: 70
Kudos: 138





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> My name is Ori and I really like Mystery Incorporated. Based off of my previous habits it was no surprise that Cassidy and Ricky wound up being my favourite characters and my favourite ship.

“I’m not sure if this is better or worse than Mayor Jones usual stunts.” Cassidy muttered to Ricky, who was sitting next to her at the newly reconstructed tiki tub, which had to be fixed after the humungonauts incident. A woman was singing, not horribly, but not particularly well. The restaurant wasn’t particularly busy, but it wasn’t empty either.

“Hmm, worse.” answered Ricky quietly, sipping water from a cup, it had been Cassidy’s idea to come here, Ricky hadn’t particularly cared where they went.

“How do you figure?” responded Cassidy, tearing her eyes away from the bright lights of the bar to watch him.

“No mysteries to solve.” except perhaps where Fred Jones senior’s intellect had gone, from Ricky’s recollection, he used to be quite clever, now he seemed more ditzy than anything else.

“Why’d he even rebuild this place?” Cassidy wondered out loud, looking around the restaurant, watching all the faces of people that they recognized, but had aged and the younger ones that they didn’t. Some people clearly recognized Angel, a few had waved at her when they came in, no one would recognize Ricky though.

“Because, dear Angel, he’s foolish.” was all Ricky could think to reply to that, “he tried to make supposedly possessed six year olds into one of his tourist traps, I wonder how quickly he would have been sued if the kids didn’t solve it.” 

“He has to have been sued at least once,” stated Cassidy, “with the amount of danger he puts everyone in everytime something strange happens.”

“And the sheriff too”

“I’m surprised he hasn’t hired a monster yet.” 

“It’s not a question of if, it’s a question of when it occurs to him, I’d give it a year.” 

“I’d say less than half a year, and it’s also a question of whether he hires a fake monster or tries to hire a monster he thinks is genuine.”

“I think we both know he’d only hire a genuine monster.”

“That’d be an interesting mystery for the gang to solve.”

“A more likely mystery is why Fred Jones senior has suddenly disappeared after he spoke to someone selling curses on the side of the road.”

Ricky drank some water, and noticed that Cassidy had barely touched her drink.

“Why aren’t you drinking that?” he gestured to her drink, which, now that he thought about it, he had no idea what the drink was.

“It’s a bit too sour for my taste.” 

“What is it?” 

“Some kind of sparkling water,” answered Cassidy, she smiled mischievously, “want to try?” Ricky took the drink from her and sipped it cautiously, and nearly spat it out to Cassidy’s delight. Cassidy laughed while Ricky grimaced

“Definitely sour.” which made Cassidy press her face to his shoulder while her entire body shook with laughter. Eventually her giggles slowed, arms snaked slowly around Ricky’s chest. Ricky wrapped an arm around her shoulder.

“Angel?” a surprised voice asked. Cassidy jumped, untangling herself from Ricky. Ricky turned to look at a teenage girl with red hair wearing a purple dress. She looked familiar, Ricky was certain she was one of the new mystery incorporated kids, Daphne Blake, if he wasn’t mistaken.

“Hey baby,” said Cassidy, who suddenly grabbed the front of his jacket, covering the telltale ‘E’ with her hand, “is the rest of the gang here?”

Daphne blinked, looking between Cassidy and Ricky for a second before she said “They’re not here, Shaggy and Scooby are watching Vincent Van Ghoul movies, Fred’s working on a trap, and Velma has to help her parents with their books.” she paused, looking at Ricky again, specifically where he had his arm around Cassidy’s shoulder. She looked back at Cassidy, who blinked 

“This is my… uh, this is Ricky.” Cassidy said, “Ricky, this is Daphne.” 

“Nice to meet you Ricky.” said Daphne with a smile, she clearly expected him to say something, probably ‘nice to meet you too’ but Ricky had already reached the realization that he could not under any circumstances talk to this girl. The gang may not know what Mr E looked like, or who he was, but, they did know what his voice sounded like and what his handwriting looked like and while Ricky could change his handwriting, he didn’t trust himself to be able to disguise his voice well enough to fool her. So, Ricky did not speak, he merely watched. Daphne’s smile faded in the momentary awkward silence constantly interrupted by the patreons around them. Cassidy seemed to catch on.

“Sorry baby, Ricky can’t talk,” Cassidy said with an air as if she had said it a thousand times, “he’s got selective mutism.”

“What’s that?” 

“Means he can’t talk under stress.”

“Oh!” said Daphne, “one of my uncles had that, he only talked to Dad, until he had a breakdown and then they took him to a mental institution.”

“Daphne, honey, there you are,” a new voice interrupted, another red haired woman who was standing in the doorway of the restaurant, “come along, we need to go home now.”

“One second Mom!” called Daphne, “bye Angel, see you tomorrow.” 

“Bye baby.” called back Cassidy at Daphne’s retreating figure, Daphne waved back as she left with her mother. 

The chatter around them continued, Ricky overheard one man ask his friend how fast he could run, another complained to someone else about how difficult university is, an elderly lady stated that if another monster caused her to have to repair property again she was moving to Florida, her companion told her that Florida is where people go to die, she replied that if she had to replace her roof again that she’d rather die.

“Well, wasn’t that interesting.” Ricky said to himself.

“I couldn’t think of anything else.”

“You’re not a very good liar, Angel.” Cassidy, when she was a child, had been very intelligent, but also naive and trusting, and even when they’d had to lie on a daily basis about their past, their names, everything, she still hadn’t been a very good liar, she wasn’t a good liar now. Years had passed and they had shed their identities like skin, she was still intelligent and while she had lost some of that naivety and trust, it was still there, underneath years and years of betrayal and heartbreak.

“Could you think of anything better?” 

Ricky sighed, because honestly, he couldn’t think of a better explanation, and even if he could, it’s not like he could have voiced it in the moment anyway. He left his silence as his answer.

“Exactly.”

“She didn’t seem to suspect anything, at least” Ricky started, at which point he realized something, “you told her my name.”

Cassidy’s eyes widened slightly, she sighed, “I was so focused on not giving you away as Mr. E that I called you Ricky instead.” she struck her head with her palm.

“It will be interesting to see if she connects the dots,” Ricky decided, he stood up, “why don’t we go? I think we’ve spent far too much time here.” 

Cassidy rose and walked alongside him to the Enigma Engine, allowing him to begin driving back to her home. They hadn’t gone to far before she spoke up

“You aren’t going to try and prevent them from finding out who you are?”

“I doubt that they’ll solve anything from the information they have at this point.”

“You're underestimating them.”

“Maybe, but only Daphne has seen me, and she didn’t see my signature ‘E’ thanks to you, she knows my name is Ricky, and Ricky isn’t an uncommon name, and it wouldn’t concern me if the kids discovered that I am Ricky Owens, because even if they discovered that much, they wouldn’t know that I am Mr E. Anyway, my identity is my concern, you needn’t worry.”

“I don’t know about that Ricky.” 

“Speak clearly Angel.”

“If those kids do manage to work out who you are, then they might work out who I am.”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Why not?”

“Because they’ll figure it out eventually anyway.”

He parked behind Cassidy's radio station, out of view of anyone who happened to pass by. Cassidy opened the passenger door and began to step out, then she paused. Her emotions and thoughts seemed to shift rapidly on her face while her muscles twitched to accommodate each and every one of them. Hardly anyone would have been able to see this almost invisible struggle, but Ricky had known her for years, and had loved her for nearly as long. As a lovestruck teenager he’d spent countless hours studying each and every atom on her face, memorising every movement she made. Her facial muscles relaxed, whatever debate going on in her mind had ended.

“Stay with me?” 

That had not at all been what Ricky had expected her to say. He had been expecting her to ask about what he was planning to do about Pericles, or the treasure, or something else along those lines. Normally, he’d have immediately declined the offer, saying that he needed to get back to work, but he wasn’t sure exactly what quality Cassidy possesed which made him inclined to listen to her. 

“Certainly.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What's that sound? That's the sound of me slamming my head against my bed post because I don't understand complex characters.

Cassidy had been told that Ricky’s ‘lair’ for lack of a better word, smelled like the sea. Ed Machine had mentioned it to her off handedly once, saying that the moat around the monitors was salt water so that the sharks could live in it. She wouldn’t know, she had no sense of smell, but she did know that it tasted like the sea. Whenever she walked near the ocean, she had always noticed the way salt seemed to almost cling to the air so strongly that when she spoke she could taste the salt on her lips.

Her first kiss had been on the beach near the clam cabin. They had successfully solved a case, and to celebrate, they all had dinner at the clam cabin, but Brad and Judy left after an hour to go on a date to the movies. Pericles left about five minutes after that. The sun had been going down, the ocean reflected every pink and orange cloud in the sky, stretching Ricky and Cassidy’s distorted shadows across the glittering sand, made of a million broken rocks and shells. They decided to watch the sunset on the beach, and then walk home. So they scampered onto a rather jagged rock near the ocean, Ricky first, then Cassidy. The waves crashed slowly and rhythmically, as if counting down to the moment the sun would set, a slight chill in the air made Cassidy lean closer to Ricky, who looked at her, before slowly wrapping an arm around her shoulder, pulling her close to him.

“Thank you,” she had said with a smile. She watched his brown eyes, she was so close to his face that she could see the flecks of different colours and shapes, like a kaleidoscope, she could see the hesitant way he brushed her hair away from her eyes, but neither she nor Ricky know who moved first, only that the in next second, she also knew that Ricky’s lips tasted like salt and clam. He was kissing her, and she was kissing him back, and like all first kisses, it was clumsy, but so perfect, salt and all. They broke the kiss, Cassidy pressed her forehead to Ricky’s. They held each other and breathed, Cassidy’s arms thrown around his neck and his free hand in her hair.

“Wow.” Whispered Cassidy, Ricky laughed nervously. 

And that was what Cassidy was reminded of when she walked into Ricky’s lair, whether she was in a good or a bad mood, whether he was being stubborn or cooperative, she always remembered that near perfect day that a clever, clumsy teenage boy kissed an smart, insecure girl as the last light of the day died and everything was right with the world. 

Today, Cassidy wasn’t at his lair for any particular reason. She didn’t always need to run the radio station, in fact she could set it up day’s in advance if she so desired, although she normally didn’t, but here she was. Ricky wasn’t actively working on anything either, all of his monitors were off, he was simply playing his keytar and had been since she had arrived.

Cassidy was reading, she enjoyed reading while Ricky played, but had decided that the book was really not to her liking. Cassidy sat the book down, hopping from the desk she was sitting on. She paused in front of Ricky. 

“Yes?” he asked, sounding slightly confused,

“Can I sit with you?” Without a word, Ricky shifted to the side. Cassidy leaned back into the chair, squished between Ricky and the armrest, the seat really wasn’t made for two people though, so Ricky paused in playing for a moment, lifting his arm up and allowing Cassidy to climb onto his lap, he simply adjusted his grip on the keytar so he could play it while she sat on him, tucked securely in his arms so that she couldn’t slip off the chair. She studied his face, he had been playing the keytar so long that he still played perfectly without even paying the slightest bit of attention. While muscle memory commanded his fingers, his mind was clearly a thousand miles away. Cassidy reached out, gently running her fingers through his hair, which seemed to rip him from wherever his mind had been, at least enough that he paused his playing again for a moment. She reached up and rested her hand on his cheek. His eyes, much too old and weary for someone who wasn’t really that old, fluttered closed. Cassidy leaned in closer laying her head against his shoulder, and resumed her playing with his long hair.

And that was how they were, hours later, when Ed Machine marched into the lair.

“Sir.” said Ed Machine, Ricky’s keytar played ceaselessly.

“What is it, Mr Machine?” 

“I thought you’d like to know what’s been happening,” he said, Ricky gestured for him to go on, “well, Crystal Cove has been over run with some sort of love spell.” 

“What?” 

“It seems to have originated from a woman calling herself Aphrodite, Mystery Incorporated has been infected, aside from Scooby, who has found some way to cure the spell.” 

Ricky set his keytar down, quickly flicking the monitors back on. Images of people holding hands and hugging were on every monitor.

“How’s this infection spread?” asked Cassidy, standing to watch the monitor where Aphrodite, who looked more like a zombie than Aphrodite, was.

“It seems to have something to do with the smell of the flowers she has.” replied Ed Machine. 

“Thank you Mr Machine.” and with that, Ed Machine left the lair.

“I think the kids might need help with this one.” said Cassidy, noticing that they had left their van in the middle of the road in the middle of town. 

“We won’t be able to use the enigma engine.” replied Ricky, following her gaze to the mystery machine in the middle of the road

“We?” 

“Daphne has already seen me, besides,” he said, grinning at her, “where's the fun in watching from a computer screen?” 

It proved harder than they both thought to sneak around Crystal Cove, even in the dim light. Virtually every citizen crowded the street, dancing and swaying in the evening, and each and every one of them would be a threat if they happened to notice that they weren’t under the love spell. Although Ricky was the only one at risk really. As Cassidy and Ricky stumbled through the hordes of people jerking around in blissful happiness, they held onto each other, which seemed to work well enough to convince the love stricken citizens that they were also under the spell.

“Watch the girl on your left,” Muttered Ricky, who was shivering slightly because he had left his jacket with the ‘E’ on it at the lair, “she’s looking at us.” Both Ricky and Cassidy smiled at her, which calmed her suspicion enough that she went back to dancing. Ricky and Cassidy turned a corner, which was filled with more flailing people and A brightly coloured van in the middle of the street.

“There’s the mystery machine,” said Cassidy quietly, “if they didn’t leave their keys in I’ll hot wire it.” 

They snuck closer, Cassidy finally letting go of Ricky’s arm so that she could climb into the driver's seat while he slunk around to the passengers seat, both Cassidy and Ricky shut their doors as silently as they could manage. She noticed something in the ignition.

“They left the keys.” noted Cassidy, turning them to start the car while Ricky buckled himself into his seat 

“Good.” said Ricky slightly distracted as he was using his phone to track where the kids were.

“I kinda wanted to hot wire it.” admitted Cassidy, swinging the mystery machine around and speeding past the afflicted people around the van.

“I know , I wanted to see you do it as well.” 

“I’ll give you a demonstration later.” said Cassidy, all tongue and cheek

“I’ll look forward to that,” replied Ricky, “turn right, they’re two block that way.”

Cassidy barreled into the street where the kids were standing, it seemed Scooby had cured them however because they were being chased by those still under the spell. She stopped the van abruptly

“What y’all waiting for, an e-vite? Move it or lose it, peeps.” she called out. The kids all jumped into the back of the van, pulling Scooby, who had something on his back, in as well. Cassidy drove away quickly after they shut the back. 

“Angel” asked Velma, “you’re not infected?”

“Hey Ricky!” said Daphne at the same time.

“That’s right Baby, I was born with no sense of smell.” said Cassidy, Ricky turned around and waved at Daphne. 

“Who are you?” Velma asked suspiciously, her eyes narrowed when Ricky didn’t respond.

“That’s Ricky, Baby, he has selective mutism, he can’t talk right now.”

“Ricky who?” 

“Ricky Fisher,” lied Angel. Velma opened her mouth, perhaps to protest further, but Daphne elbowed her.

“Have we been introduced?” said a familiar german accented voice. 

“Professor Pericles?” 

“So nice to meet you, Angel and Ricky.” he said quietly. Ricky’s eyes narrowed, but he stared out the window instead of turning around again.

Something didn’t add up, Velma was sure of it, she just wasn’t sure what it was yet. Nothing about Angel’s ‘friend’ was glaringly wrong, except the fact that he hadn’t said a word since they had entered the van, but Angel had said that he had selective mutism so that’s to be expected. His clothes were fairly average, a striped shirt and black pants and shoes, his hair was long, but a lot of people had long hair, he had bags under his eyes and looked a little beaten down. None of that was suspicious or worthy of any more thought, and the only thing that Velma could think of that was at all weird was that Angel had never mentioned a Ricky Fisher before. Maybe she just met him? No, Angel wouldn’t have brought someone she just met to sneak around Crystal Cove and steal the mystery machine. Angel didn’t share every part of her life with them, so she might have just neglected to mention him? That was possible, but...

“We gotta find out who she is and what she wants.” Fred said, interrupting Velma’s thoughts.

“Like, maybe she’s a gorgon that rose from the dead and she’s gonna turn us all into an army of vampire robots.” said Shaggy, miming as if he were a vampire, ‘that sounds familiar’ thought Velma.

“Wait a sec, that’s the plot from Vincent Van Ghoul’s ‘Gorgon parade.” stated Velma

“And it was based on a true story.” retorted Shaggy

“Far be it from me, a tiny thumbless avain to hazard a guess but did anyone else notice her choice of clothing, specifically the style?” said Professor Pericles, flying to perch on the door handle.

“Wait a sec, she was wearing a prom dress,” realized Daphne

“Then that’s where we’ll start.” said Fred, pushing the gear into drive.

They winded up in the library, searching old documents and trying to find the same prom dress that Aprodite was wearing. Cassidy, grabbed another yearbook, flipping through it and hoping to spot the same prom dress.

“Hey gang! I got something,” said Velma, triumphantly holding up a newspaper, “this girl went to school here, and she’s wearing the same dress. Her name was Amanda Smythe and she was some sort of chemistry wiz.” Daphne started saying something, but Cassidy’s attention had been captured by Ricky who was texting someone on his phone, which in itself wouldn’t have been attention grabbing but he looked irritated. She wanted to ask, but knew communication wasn’t practical at the moment. 

“Time to set a trap? Trap time? Boy you guys. You think you’d know by now.” said Fred, walking away while the gang trailed behind.

“What do we need?” 

“Velma and Shaggy, you guys go get fire extinguishers, Scooby and Pericles, you make enough of the antidote to fix everyone under the spell, Angel and Ricky, you get guitar cases from the band room, Daphne and I will get clothes so that we can disguise ourselves.” instructed Fred. Everyone left for their respective jobs, including Cassidy and Ricky. Once they reached the band room Cassidy finally spoke up,

“What’s got you riled up?” 

“Pericles set this up.” 

“How do you know that?” Cassidy asked, Ricky handed her his phone, and on screen was the text conversation he had been having with Ed Machine for the last ten minutes

‘Professor Pericles sent a recording.’ wrote Ed Machine

‘What did it say?’ Ricky wrote back

‘He said that he set up this entire case so that he could gather some items to help him look for the treasure.’

Cassidy scrolled over the back and forth while they gathered information to the most recent text

‘When this is over, I want you to approach the gang and play the recording for them, and provide an explanation of the cursed treasure.’

‘Yes sir.’ 

“You’re going to tell them about the curse?” 

“It’d be for the best that they know before Pericles does anything else.”

“Can we tell them that this is Pericles doing?” 

“No,” answered Ricky, handing her a guitar case, “too suspicious.”

“So what do we do?” asked Cassidy, preparing to walk back to where the kids were setting their trap, “play along?” 

“Yes, unfortunately” said Ricky with a grimace, grabbing a guitar case he found, “let’s go.”

The room had an almost dreamlike quality. Everyone swayed and giggled slowly, it really was incredibly disturbing. Cassidy pushed a stroller with the antidote in it through the crowd, trying to ignore how deeply disturbing the entire scene was. Shaggy approached, discreetly grabbing a fire extinguisher filled with antidote. Cassidy tossed Velma a fire extinguisher, then Scooby. Ricky grabbed a fire extinguisher, Cassidy picked one up as well.

“Now!” called Fred. Cassidy flipped on the fire extinguisher, blasting everyone she could in the green liquid. Almost instantly two people who had been hugging scoffed at one another and walked away, and another couple glared at one another.

“You idiots! Stop them!” screamed Aphrodite, which only caused Shaggy, Scooby and Daphne to spray the remaining people, including Mayor Jones, with the antidote. The metal crown she had been so obsessed with fell and clattered down the steps.

“My crown! No!” and a green canvas fell on top of her, then tightening to pull her up and hold her about five feet off the ground horizontally.

“I am the goddess of love!” screamed the crazed woman, “bow at the feet of Aphrodite!”

“I think you mean Amanda,” said Velma, ripping the mask off of a pretty young woman's face, “Amanda Smythe?”

“Oh you think you’re so smart…” cried Amanda, proceeding with her ramblings about how she was humiliated and vowed revenge and used chemistry to do it. Then the sheriff and officers picked her up and started to carry her away. 

“And I would have succeeded too, if it wasn’t for your olfactory-challenged sidekicks.” Amanda muttered  
“I am no one’s sidekick,” said Pericles, which was probably the most truthful thing he had said all evening.

“You said it,” agreed Scooby Doo. Amanda was finally dragged out the door.

“Hmm, I do think this concludes my time with you today,” said Pericles, launching into the air, staring at each of the kids in turn, then his gaze fixed on Cassidy and Ricky, “ Auf Wiedersehen, kinder,” and he was gone before anyone could say anything else. People started to clear out in a huff, clearly not pleased with the situation and the fact they’re covered in green slime. 

“Like, Angel? Do you and Ricky need a ride?” asked Shaggy, removing the monocle he was wearing.

“Yeah, thanks kids.” 

“No problem, just let us get changed and we’ll drive you home.” said Fred as Velma and Daphne had already left to go change, Shaggy and Fred followed. Scooby shook off the dress and hat, it didn’t matter to him, being a dog and all. The kids were back before too long though, Cassidy and Ricky followed them outside to the mystery machine. 

“Well, Scooby Doo, like, you saved the day.” Shaggy said while he pet Scooby’s head

“And Pericles too.” replied Scooby

“I guess even a diabolical criminal bird can change his evil and malevolent ways.” said Daphne, unaware that he had not in fact, changed his ways.

“Highly doubtful.” Ed Machine said, walking creepily out of an alleyway, everyone jumped back a bit in surprise and fear.

“Who- who are you?” stuttered Shaggy and Scooby in unison

“I am an associate of Mr. E, Pericles left him a message that you should hear.” he said, pressing a button on a recorder

“It was I who gave Aphrodite the secret formula,” said Pericles’s voice, proceeding to rehash how he had done so, he ended the message with, “your move, Mr. E.”

“Okay, can I get a teeny little time out here? What does any of that stuff have to do with anything?” 

“The curse of the haunted treasure, an ancient fortune left behind by the conquistadors that first settled this area, legend has it that it’s buried somewhere deep beneath us, and it now appears Pericles is on the verge of discovering it and if he does, I could well mean the end of Crystal Cove.” With that, Ed Machine walked away, across the street and turning a corner out of sight. 

“Umm, what?”

“Cursed treasure?” 

“Pericles tricked us!”

“Why did he say that this could be the end of Crystal Cove?!”

“Enough,” snapped Velma tiredly, she took a deep breath, “it’s late, and today’s been a long day, we need to get home, we can worry about this in the morning.”

“Besides, like, we did say we’d drive Angel and Ricky back to K-Ghoul.” pointed out Shaggy, still clearly shaken from what Ed Machine had just said

“Come on gang.” said Fred as he hopped into the driver's seat. Daphne and Velma slid into the passengers seats, Shaggy, Scooby, Cassidy, and Ricky all sat in the back. Cassidy remembered when she and her friends had driven the enigma engine, she had always sat in the back with either Ricky or Judy, but it was more often than not Ricky with Pericles on his shoulder sitting with her. Shaggy was stroking Scooby’s head, again and again and again, clearly anxious and trying to calm down, Velma leaned against the door with her eyes closed, Daphne fiddled with the radio, switching from station to station, not staying on any frequency long enough to actually hear a song, Fred focused on driving. Ricky leaned against the side of the mystery machine, staring at the sky. 

“Hey, Angel?” asked Daphne who’s switching stations distraction tactic clearly wasn’t working anymore. 

“Yeah baby?”

“How long have you lived in Crystal Cove?”

“About five years,” which wasn’t technically a lie, she had moved back five years ago. The van stopped moving.

“Here we are.” Cassidy opened the back door and jumped out, Ricky right behind her.

“Thanks for the rescue today, Angel.” 

“You’re welcome kids, try and stay safe.” replied Cassidy before shutting the door. The mystery machine drove away. Ricky turned away from Cassidy.

“Ricky?” Ricky had become very good at hiding over the years, it probably helped that the only people he interacted with on a daily basis worked for him, but they both knew that he could never hide from Cassidy. He could and would try, but there had never been a time that it had worked. Two adults who had met as children, fallen in love as teenagers, and been forced to grow up too fast stood in front of a radio station, and though neither would admit it, both were deeply afraid and uncertain. Cassidy knew nothing could be said that would make this day better or easier for herself or for him. She walked around him, stopping to stand in front of him, sighing she reached for his hand, and he allowed her to pull him into the radio station without complaint.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Does anyone else get the impression from Daphne that she's somewhat of a shipper or is that just me?

Ricky had nightmares. Not the mild unsettling nightmares, although he experienced those as well, but the type of dreams that left you sweating and jumping up in bed at the odd hours of the night. 

He remembered being about five years old, spending his days playing outside under a tree, alone, until the sun began to set and shadows disappeared. He didn’t remember what he dreamed about those nights then and he didn’t years later, but he woke up screaming nearly every night. His parents, who were thoroughly sick of being woken up, tried everything they could possibly think of to help him sleep. First they tried a dreamcatcher, telling him that it’d catch the bad dreams, but Ricky still screamed and cried that night. Then they tried a nightlight, to no avail. After that they took him to a doctor, who told them that there was nothing wrong with Ricky and that he’d grow out of it eventually. He didn’t, but he did learn how to stop himself from waking his parents, which was that he covered his head with a pillow and that muffled the screams enough that it didn’t bother his parents anymore, but the nightmares persisted. 

Ricky had been six when Professor Pericles crashed into a tree and Ricky still couldn’t sleep at night. Which Pericles noticed immediately. 

“Ricky, you should be sleeping should you not?” Pericles asked the first night after he decided to stay with Ricky. 

“I want to see the stars first,” Ricky replied, which wasn’t entirely untrue, but was really an excuse so he wouldn’t have to sleep yet. Pericles watched him knowingly. 

“Lie down on your bed,” ordered Pericles a few nights later, “and cover yourself with the blanket.”

Ricky complied with the demand in childish surprise, scrambling from the window he was watching out of onto the bed and quickly wrapping himself in the covers, he almost immediately began to fall asleep, this was combated by his heart reaching tachycardia and adrenaline running through his veins.

Pericles flew and flicked the light off with ease before he fluttered down and landed on the bed frame, just above Ricky’s head.

“What are you doing?” Ricky asked tiredly, despite his best efforts, he was completely exhausted.

“I will be watching over you,” he replied, fluttering his feathers, “it would be truly abhorrent of you to disregard sleep over nightmares.”

“I’m not.” Ricky replied through a yawn, his eyes already fluttering.

“ Schlaf, my dear Ricky, Sei ruhig, I will see that you are safe.” Pericles said as Ricky drifted off to sleep, and for the first time in a very long time, his nightmares weren’t so bad.

He still had nightmares however, just less often than he used to. He was 16 when he, Brad, Judy, Pericles, and Cassidy spent two nights trying to catch a monster just outside of town, they eventually succeeded in catching a fake werewolf who was stealing the local grocery store’s supplies. It was late.

“I’ll drive.” said Judy, holding her hands out for the keys, which Ricky handed over

“Thanks Judy.” said Brad and Ricky at the same time

“No worries.” Judy and Brad climbed into the driver and passengers seats respectively, Cassidy and Ricky sat in the back, Pericles perched on the passenger's seat just behind Brad’s head. Judy backed up and pulled into the street that led back to Crystal Cove, and the next thing Ricky remembered was screaming. He wondered where the screaming was coming from briefly, then realizing that his mouth was opened and his throat hurt, he stopped screaming, his face pressed into someones shoulder.

“Ricky!?” Cried Cassidy who’s shoulder he had been screaming into

“Are you alright?” asked Brad in concern

“I’m okay,” he whispered, although he was shaking in Cassidy’s embrace, “I’m okay.”

“If I may interject,” started Pericles, “while I believe it would be rather beneficial for Ricky to attempt to rest, it may be that this is not the best place for that, he will be quite alright once he reaches home and sleeps there.” Judy, who was driving at about five miles over the speed limit at that point, only went faster. 

Ricky heard something hit the ground, it made a dull thump. His eyes shot open, It was dark and he could only see the room dimly. A rather plain room with only a bed, a bed stand with a lamp and some paintings on the wall he couldn’t make out. It then occurred to him that he was in fact next to the bed on the floor, and that he had just fallen off of said bed. The blankets were tangled around his feet and twisted into something more resembling rope than a blanket. ‘I must have been thrashing.’ he thought tiredly. His brain tried desperately to come up with where exactly he was and what had happened, his thoughts quickly shifted between several things of varying importance, where are his shoes, where exactly is he, why is he here, where did his jacket go. He shivered, the floor was cold and with both his shoes and jacket missing so was he. The door creaked open slowly, light permeating the room, which he finally recognized. The memories of the previous day came flooding back, he sighed, almost wishing he could forget so he might be allowed some peace

“Ricky?” 

“Cassidy.”

“Are you hurt?”

“Just my pride.” Cassidy crept further into the room, kneeling beside where Ricky pushed himself up into a seated position. She had changed into an oversized t-shirt and loose shorts, she looked tired, her eyes half closed. Ricky pulled the twisted blanket off his feet, tossing it up and back on the bed. They were both silent for a moment, the only noise was what could be heard through the closed window, the chirp of crickets and the perpetual life that persisted despite the darkness.

“I can’t sleep,” she admitted quietly, it pained him as well as comforted him that Pericles’s disturbance had upset her just as much as it upset him. He didn’t say anything to that, there really was nothing to say anyway, his sleep was riddled with nightmares and fatigue just as hers. Cassidy stood up, offering her hand to pull Ricky up as well.

“Why don’t we sleep in my room tonight?” she suggested, “it’s warmer.” That really meant she sensed that Ricky didn’t want to be alone, and she didn’t want to be alone either. Ricky followed her into her room. She climbed into the bed tossing aside the covers.

“Here.” she gestured to the empty side, which Ricky flopped into, laying on his back. Cassidy pulled the covers over both of them, as if to protect them from whatever bad dreams were sure to come. She relaxed against her pillow, eyes closed but clearly not asleep. Cassidy was always beautiful, she always had been, but there was something almost angelic about how Cassidy’s face would relax and all of the worry in her eyes would fade away. Cassidy suddenly rolled over, pushing herself so that she was laying on his chest. Her heart was beating just above where his was, her face inches from his. Cassidy pressed her forehead to Ricky’s.

“Ricky?” 

“Yes?”

“Are you okay?”

“I…” Ricky was physically unharmed, but seeing his previous best friend had taken a lot out of him, “don’t know.”

Cassidy sighed, she was never as close to Pericles as Ricky, but he’d still been her friend “That’s fair.” still half asleep, she began to actually fall asleep, her head resting against Ricky’s neck.

“Angel?”

“Hmm?” she mumbled in a rough voice, clearly seconds away from drifting off. 

“Nevermind.” answer Ricky quietly, although Cassidy, now unconscious, didn’t hear that response.

  
  


The early morning sun brightened the room, peaking through the closed curtains and hitting Ricky in the eyes. He took a deep breath, keeping his eyes closed but unable to ignore the sun and go back to sleep. He would have covered his eyes with his forearm, but something warm was grasping his wrist. He opened one eye slightly to find Cassidy curled up on his chest, fingers curled in his hair, her face pressed into his neck. She was breathing deeply, seemingly still asleep. It was not the first time Ricky had woken up with Cassidy, but it was one of the rare times she hadn’t woken up before him. 

“Angel,” he whispered, shaking her slightly, “Angel, wake up.”

She muttered something, still asleep face twitching slightly into an almost worried expression. She breathed sharply, sluggishly pushing herself upright so that she was half sitting half lying on his chest.

“Good morning,” he said.

“What time is it?” she mumbled, rolling off his chest. She blinked, bleary eyed before she looked at the clock, suddenly awake and out of the room towards the sound booth in her radio station. Ricky glanced at the clock on her bed stand, it was 7:59, and most days Cassidy needed to speak on the radio at 8:00. Ricky stood up and made to follow Cassidy, who ran so quickly she was quite literally bouncing off the walls, if bouncing meant running so fast she almost slammed into the wall and pushed herself off of them. 

Daphne was in the living room, placing some items on an unused space on the table. She jumped, alarmed at the speed at which Cassidy ran past her into the sound booth, she jumped again when she noticed that Ricky was standing right next to her.

“Hi Ricky!” she said with a tired smile, it was still early, after all, “we’re dropping some stuff off before school, I just need to ask Angel something.” Daphne clearly didn’t expect a response, but Ricky had an idea. He held up a hand, as if that offered any sort of explanation to what he was doing, and grabbed a piece of blank printer paper from the table, and a pen which Cassidy kept near the printer paper. He scribbled quickly, making sure to change his handwriting so that she wouldn’t recognize it.

‘Hello Daphne. I understand, but what exactly do you need to ask Angel?’ he flipped the paper so that Daphne could see. Her expression brightened.

“Cool! Now I can talk to you,” she said, seemingly she hadn’t processed the note yet, she reread it before answering, “Oh, I need to ask if we can have a meeting here after school.” 

‘Angel isn’t busy tonight, she won’t mind you being here.’ 

“Thanks,” she said, something seemed to occur to her in that moment, “will you be here too?” Would he? It wasn’t like he had anything else to do tonight.

‘Yes.’ A honk blared from outside K-Ghoul. Daphne immediately began to depart, she turned around at the last moment “Bye Ricky.” and with that she was gone. Cassidy was finished speaking and stepped out of the sound booth. She looked at the pictures and documents that Daphne had left in a pile on the table.

“What did they need?”

“They wanted to come by later.”

“Oh, that’s fine then.”

“I think I’ll come by later too.”

“Oh? Okay.” 

“You had an idea for how to steer them in the right direction?” She had mentioned this to him a few days ago, he hadn’t asked for any further information at that time.  
“Yeah,” said Cassidy, walking back into the soundbooth to pick up an old diary, “this.”

“Whose diary is that?”

“Hmm, you’ll be here later? When the kids are here?”

“Yes.”

“Guess you’ll see then.”

“You really aren’t going to tell me?” he asked in amusement

“No,” she replied with a laugh, falling into a couch nearby, “you still solve mysteries as a hobby, you work it out.”

“I have a proposition.” replied Ricky, sitting down next to her. This seemed to pique her interest.

“I’ll bite.”

“Let's play twenty questions,” answered Ricky, “let me try and guess who that diary belonged to, if I get it right you’ll tell me, if I don’t I’ll let you surprise me.” 

Cassidy seemed to consider for a moment, clearly weighing the pros and cons of beating Ricky and him winning. 

“Hm, I really want to surprise you, how about five questions?” 

Victory, but not he hadn’t won the war just yet, he still needed to guess in ¼ the questions “sure.” 

“Is this diary old?” it looked old, but plenty of new books look worn and plenty of old books look new.

“Old is relative, four questions.” replied Cassidy with an impish grin.

“I contest that that should count.” 

“Contestation noted, still four questions though.” 

“Fine, did this diary belong to one of the previous mystery solving groups?”

“Yes it did, three.”

“Is it more than thirty years old?” if it was under thirty years that meant that it belonged to someone in their group

“No, two questions.”

“Did it belong to a girl?” 

“Yes, one question.”

“Did this girl wear glasses?” 

“Yes.”

“You’re giving them your diary?”

“Yeah, I’ll just tell them Mr. E left it on my doorstep.”

  
  


Velma hated and loved study hall. It took place in the computer room, and she could spend time researching, those were the only benefits. The kids around her talked loudly about whatever came to mind, and for some reason that Velma couldn’t fathom, Gary and Ethan kicked a soccer ball around the tables and occasionally into peoples heads. One girl sitting two seats away from her suddenly smashed her head into a computer monitor after a soccer ball struck the back of her head.

“Ouch!”

“Be more careful, everyone!” was the disinterested and seemingly disheartened teachers response to that.

It was the last period of the day, which now that Velma thought about it was probably why the teacher didn’t care about Gary and Ethan’s antics. Velma was done with all of the work she needed to accomplish. 

She boredly typed ‘Crystal Cove.’ into google. The first search results all had to do with tourist attractions or conspiracy theories surrounding the town. She clicked on a link that claimed that Crystal Cove didn’t exist and was a mass hallucination, the evidence seemed to be that this place just couldn’t possibly exist and it was just too far fetched. Another link stated that the entire town was possessed by demons. Velma returned to the google search bar, she typed in ‘Velma Dinkly.’ which just pulled up her blog and some news reports from Crystal Coves paper about captured monsters, and under that her mother and father’s museum. ‘Shaggy Rogers’ brought up news reports and his social media. ‘Scooby’ had identical results. ‘Fred Jones’ was such a common name that it showed nothing relevant. ‘Daphne Blake’ only served to be a testament to how truly insane her family was. Velma considered who to search next, she hardly wanted to search for anyone in her school, or her friend’s parents. She typed ‘Angel Dynamite’ into the search engine, it brought up K-Ghoul and a page for K-Ghoul, and little else. ‘Does Angel have any social media?’ wondered Velma, she clicked on images, and received assorted images of renaissance angel paintings, explosives and other things unrelated to the inquiry. 

“Guess not,” she muttered to herself. Velma then remembered Angel’s friend, 

“What was his name? Oh yeah, Ricky Fisher.” she typed it into google, but because Ricky and Fisher are both extraordinarily common names it dredged up nothing. ‘Ricky Fisher Crystal Cove’ Nothing, but a few assorted articles from twenty years ago. Velma went to click on a link, when suddenly, BAM, the sound of something hitting the ground caught her attention. Her eyes shot away from the computer monitor unto the ground directly to her left. Scattered batteries, plastic calculator and a soccer ball that Gary grabbed without so much as an apology, not that Velma expected one anyway. The thing hitting the ground was her calculator, which had been sent flying courtesy of Gary and Ethan. Three of the four batteries were gone and Velma glanced at the time, the bell would be ringing in about forty seconds. She scooped up the calculator, logged out of the computer and ran out the door when the bell did ring.

  
  


“Alright kids, I need to finish up broadcasting, give me a second,” said Cassidy, who abruptly closed the door to the sound booth. Velma went back to pinning things to a cork board she had brought. Ricky, who had just walked in as she said that slouched down on the couch next to Shaggy. 

“Hi Ricky,” said Daphne

‘Hello Daphne.’ Ricky quickly wrote back on the notebook he had brought, he held it so she could see.

“Like, why didn’t you do that last time?” Shaggy asked while scratching his head

‘I didn’t have paper.’ 

“Oh, right, like my bad.” 

“Do you normally do that?” asked Daphne

‘Normally with work related matters.’ he wrote truthfully

“What about not work related things?” asked Daphne, 

‘It depends on the circumstances.’ which was also true. Whenever he spoke to Brad and Judy these days it was over email or texting.

“So, where are you from?” asked Velma, still completely focused on her cork board. 

Ricky had been trying not to lie to a point, because enough lies would cause suspicion and create holes in his story, he wrote ‘California.’ and held it for Daphne to see

“California.” repeated Daphne

“What part of California?”

‘I live here, if that’s what you’re asking.’ which Daphne read aloud.

“Have you always lived here?” 

‘No’ he had moved although he knew that wasn’t what Velma meant

Just that moment the soundbooth door swung open

“Okay kids, lay it on, and don’t hold out on me.” said Cassidy, hands on her hips.

“Okay, here are the clues we have so far that we know are linked to the curse of the haunted treasure…” She first mentioned Judy’s locket they had found in the caves, then Pericles and his escape, then the darrow family and then, Mr. E.

“Mr. E left this on my doorstep last night.” said Cassidy, handing the diary to Daphne.

“Weird. It doesn’t have the standard ‘E’ stamped on the front,” noted Daphne, she flipped open the diary to a random page and started to read aloud, “‘Dear diary, man I dig Ricky…’” Ricky glanced at Cassidy, whose eyes immediately widened in slight disbelief.

“‘Last night I fantasized he took me in his big strong arms…’” Cassidy’s head was turned to stare in the opposite direction from where Ricky was sitting, and although he couldn’t see her face he knew that all of the blood in her body had rushed to her head.

“‘On a magic carpet ride all the way to the mysterious perfumed gullies of romancylvania.’” Fred, Shaggy and Scooby all made faces, Daphne paused, flipping another page, “This belonged to Cassidy Williams.”

“Try the last entry before they disappeared,” said Cassidy quickly, clearly hoping to avoid more personal entries being read aloud.

“‘Dear diary, in our quest to track down the cursed treasure, we leave tonight to search the site of the old darrow mansion.’”

“That’s weird,” said Velma, pointing out that they had disappeared from the caves.

“That mansion used to stand where darrow college is now,” said Cassidy, looking at information she already knew on her phone screen. Ricky tuned out the conversion and flipped over a page in his notebook, quickly sketching a rough blueprint of the building above the buried darrow mansion, and where the darrow mansion would be under it, adding the coordinates to the side. 

‘I looked at the blueprints when I considered going to darrow college, it looked something like that.’ he wrote, handing it to Shaggy when he finished, he related the information to his friends.

“Thank you,” said Velma carefully.

“Well gang, I think that settles it!” said Fred cheerfully, “we’ll be going to darrow college tomorrow.”

The kids left soon after, citing their need to get home. They watched as the van drove off. 

Cassidy still refused to make direct eye contact. He briefly considered teasing her, but remembering the fact she was an accomplished fighter and could use disks as deadly projectiles he decided against it.

“Do you remember how Judy tried to set us up?” Ricky said instead. Cassidy sighed, moving to her sink and splashing her face with some water.

“Yeah, she must have tried a million different things.”

“She locked us in a closet, she tripped you so i’d catch you, she kept finding ways to separate us from the group,” listed Ricky, counting on his hand.

“Did you know she tried to set us up on a blind date?” 

“Oh, yes, I forgot about that, Pericles sabotage it.”

“He did? Really?” she asked, finally sitting to relax on the couch.

“I was apparently showing too much interest in you, it made him jealous,” explained Ricky, “after I agreed to the blind date that Judy suggested, he found out that it was you, so, he tricked me into getting stuck on the roof of Crystal Cove High.”

“Oh yeah, I remember that.”

“I was so scared when I couldn’t get down, then a few minutes later I saw you walking on the sidewalk, so I screamed ‘Cassidy! help!’ To get your attention.”

“The football players laughed at us.”

“I expected little else from them, I was too frightened to care.”

“I know, your eyes looked like they were about to pop out of your skull, I don’t think I’ve ever run so fast in my life.”

“Where did you get the ladder you used? I never asked.”

“I stole it temporarily from the home economics teacher.”

“Well, he was rude anyway.”

“Right? Anyway, when you finally got down you hugged me so tight I couldn’t breath.”

“You always were my guardian angel, I was so happy when you asked if I wanted to hang out at your house, I had completely forgotten about the blind date. Mrs Williams was home.”

“When you went into my room she stopped me and asked ‘I thought you were going on a date?’ I said that you needed me more than whoever my date was, she just shrugged and left us alone.”

“We fell asleep on your bed listening to music.”

“My Dad came home and we were still asleep.”

“Oh god, I thought he was going to kill me!” Ricky exclaimed, he remembered how quickly his heart had stopped when Cassidy’s Dad had swung the door open, asked them ‘What do you think you’re doing?’

“So did I!”

“I owe my life to your mother.”

“She wanted us to date, she kept telling me she thought we’d make a cute couple.”

“Good thing, or I’d be dead.”

“Judy asked me how the date had gone the next day.”

“What’d you tell her?”

“That I had to save you from a roof, she looked annoyed.”

“I remembered the date halfway through the day, I apologized and explained that I had been trapped on a roof, she told me it was fine because my date was busy anyway.”

“She must have been so frustrated.”

“That her trap didn’t work? Yes, I’m sure she was.”

Cassidy went quiet for a moment, she sighed, tilting her head back she said “Never could have predicted how our lives turned out.”

“It’s not all bad." he said, reaching out to grasp her hand.

She opened her eyes slightly, squeezing his hand gently, “no, I suppose not.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I was writing this chapter I was talking to my good friend, and said something to the effect of "Nowhere in the show does Ricky ever seem to leave Destroido, so my headcanon is that he lives in the basement of Destroido." and my friend said something like, "yeah that's what I thought too." By the way, thank you so much, dear friend, since I know you'll read this, thank you so much for your encouragement!

Cassidy wasn’t entirely certain what the kids would find in the Darrow mansion. Her friends hadn’t found much there.

“Brad, look at this,” Judy had said upon finding the chimney that led to the Darrow mansion.

“Well done Judy,” replied Brad as he pointed his flashlight into the decrepit chimney. 

“Thank you Brad.”

Cassidy leaned over to see the vine covered brick, which Judy used to her advantage to slow her descent, but she still landed with a loud thump. Brad followed closely behind, he slipped halfway down and landed next to Judy. Pericles hopped off of Ricky’s shoulder to fly down without any of the issues of those who couldn’t fly. Cassidy climbed down carefully making sure to grasp the vines and any of the bricks that jutted out enough to make a good ladder. When she reached the bottom it was Ricky’s turn to climb down, but the vine he grabbed snapped and Ricky missed all the rest of the vines and fell all the way down onto Cassidy. The breath left her lungs and she struck the ground with all of her weight and Ricky splayed on top of her.

“Sorry!” he cried anxiously, he jumped off of her as quickly as he could, he helped her stand. Cassidy adjusted her glasses, dust covered every surface of the room, it swirled in the air so stale that it was almost suffocating. Despite the atmosphere of the old house, they had walked around for hours and found nothing, eventually forced to leave before school started the next morning. 

The kids might find something though, and if anything, at least it wasn’t too dangerous. Cassidy worried about them, she knew that it was probably counterproductive to worry about them when she was actively working to find the disk pieces as well, or at least keep Pericles from finding the disk pieces. She was fairly certain that Ricky was honestly more interested in stopping Pericles from getting the pieces than he was in getting them for himself. He was angry, Pericles had betrayed them, he had loved Pericles and Pericles had  _ betrayed  _ him, and as far as Cassidy could tell, that was the real reason that he wanted to get the disk. Being honest with herself she didn’t really care, the reason she worked with Ricky at its core was because she worried about him, she worried about what this was going to do to him and she worried about what it was going to do to the gang. She had lost so much, she had lost her parents, her home, her name, her identity and Ricky had lost just as much as she had. She just wanted this cursed treasure to be found so she could move on, and maybe that's another reason why Ricky wanted to find it too. 

She and Ricky had dinner and then he left, and she was alone with her worry. That had been last night and the gang should be back from the Darrow mansion soon. Before he had left Ricky had mentioned he’d be keeping an eye on them. It wouldn’t surprise her if he had cameras around Darrow college so that was probably what he meant.

She spun a disk between her hands absentmindedly while she chose new songs to play, tapping her foot with the song. Tap, swosh, tap, swosh. This was soon interrupted by a new sound, her phone chiming. She picked it up without even bothering to check who it was from. 

‘They’ve found a disk piece.’ and that worry that had been eating at the edge of her thoughts willed itself into something closer to trepidation than worry and then her phone chimed again, ‘they are unharmed.’ Her growing dread abated just a little bit.

  
  


“And this is Angel Dynamite signing off for tonight, have a good night Crystal Cove.” she said as she finished up. She flicked the microphone off and opened the door to the soundbooth. The sun had set a few moments earlier and the dark made it impossible to see further than her hands, she walked towards the light switch and nearly ran into a figure who had been standing right next to it. Before Cassidy had processed the uninvited visitor, she reacted, grabbing the figure by the arm and slamming it into the wall with her other arm. The figure cried out in a small, startled yelp. She pinned the figure slightly above the ground before she finally realized who it was. 

“Angel!” cried Daphne, Cassidy instantly released her.

“I’m so sorry Baby, I didn’t see you there,” she flicked on a light, quickly checking Daphne over, “I didn’t hurt you did I?”

“No,” she said, brushing off her sleeves, “you just scared me is all.”

“Kid, you scared the living daylights out of me, next time you or your friends come to my house this late make sure to switch on a light.” Cassidy looked around the room only to find that no one else was there, “hang on, where’s the rest of the gang?” 

“I don’t know, at home probably?” she paused, as if thinking about how to ask something.

Taking pity on her struggle to articulate whatever was going on behind her eyes Cassidy smiled at her, “Do you want something to drink?” Daphne nodded, taking a seat at the table, “Well, I’ve got water, milk, and some orange juice.”

“I’ll have water,” Daphne said, Cassidy poured some out into a cup and handed it to her as she sat across from her, “thanks Angel.”

“No problem Baby, anyhow, how was the Darrow mansion lead?”

“We got into Darrow mansion no problem, but then the chimney we climbed through sealed shut.”

“That’s weird, what could have done that?”

“We didn’t even have time to wonder about that. Some sort of speaker on a table switched on and a voice told us ‘Welcome back Mystery Incorporated’ and told us that he had placed traps all over the house and we’d never get out.”

“‘Welcome back?’” wondered Cassidy out loud, only one possibility came to mind, “it must have been talking about the original Mystery Incorporated.”

“Yeah, Fred got excited when the voice mentioned traps, you know him,” she said fondly, “the voice called him Brad, then he called me Judy, then he thought Velma was Cassidy, Shaggy was Ricky, and Scooby was Pericles.”’

‘What?’ though Cassidy to herself, no one had been in the Darrow mansion, had they?

“He managed to separate us after we set off some of his traps, Fred and I were tied up in a empty pool and Fred had to figure out how to get us out while it was flooded, Shaggy, Scooby and Velma were put in a room filled with trip wire and knives.”

“Fred must have been enjoying this.” 

“Oh he was ecstatic,” she said with a dreamy smile

“So, what happened next?”

“Oh, and then we found each other again, so we looked around and found a room that had a radio microphone and a pot with dead rats.”

“Ew.”

“It was gross, but then this old guy ran into the room, he told us he’s Danny Darrow and tried to attack us but we managed to get him out of the room and we barricaded the door, but when we moved the cabinet, this… artifact fell out,” ‘The disk piece,’ Cassidy thought. Daphne continued, “Danny Darrow kept calling it his treasure.”

“I’m assuming he got in?”

“He broke the door with a fire poker so we ran behind the walls and he tried to stab us with the sharp part of the fire poker, but he missed and we fell through the loose floorboards into a secret tunnel and back into the main part of the house. Freddy took this as a personal challenge and he set up one of his traps.” Daphne explained, finally pausing to take a sip of the water she had been given.

“I’m guessing that you caught him?”

“We did. When he realized that we weren't the old Mystery Incorporated he told us that the artifact is cursed, that he hadn’t even really realized time had passed. Then the old Mystery Incorporated showed up and he spied on then and built traps to prey on their weaknesses.”

“He waited that long?” Cassidy found that incredibly creepy, he had been so lost he hadn’t noticed that twenty years had come and gone.

“I don’t think he really had an understanding of time anymore,” Daphne said almost sadly.

“Makes sense.”

“All the traps going off made the house split and tear, so part of it lead above ground, Danny Darrow told us to keep the artifact, then he told us to go.”

“Do you know what the artifact is?”

“Not yet,” she paused again, a contemplative expression on her face.

“Child, if you have something to say you can just say it, I won’t bite”

She laughed, “yeah, I’m being kind of silly, I came here to ask for some advice.”

“Not sure how good I am at advice, but I’ll give it my best shot,” Cassidy replied, leaning forward in her chair.

“It’s about Fred.”

“Go on.”

“Well, my parents don’t really like him that much, I want to find some way of getting them to approve of him.”

“That’s a difficult one. What exactly don’t they like about Fred?”

“They think he’s weird and that he’ll get me into trouble.”

“Hm, a bit ironic that they’d call  _ him  _ the strange one,” she thought out loud before returning to the matter at hand, “you’ll have to find some way of making him look presentable to their standards.”

“How can I do that?” she asked, her forehead working itself into lines.

“Well, do your parents ever try and set you up with boys that they want you to date?”

“Yes, but they don’t want me to date Fred.”

“I know, but here's the thing, your parents are, from what I’ve seen, aloof, haughty, and trying to maintain an image. The reason they care about who you date is that it reflects onto them and the image they project. If you can find some way of presenting Fred as if he’d fit into that image then they might warm up to him. So, when your parents have a boy they want you to date, how do they normally try and introduce him to you?”

“At parties.”

“You can work with that.”

Daphne remained silent for a moment, tilting her head, “so if I bought Fred to a party my parents throw they won’t be as harsh because it’ll prove he won’t ruin their image?”

“That’s what I’m thinking.”

Daphne seemed to consider this, she sighed, eyes glued to her hands, “But what if it doesn’t work?”

“Baby, will you love Fred any less if your parents don’t like him?”

“No,” she said frowning, “but I still want them to like him.”

“They might never like him, and there might be nothing you can do to change that.”

“I just wish they could see him the way I do.”

“In all honesty Daphne, you and your parents are very different people.”

Daphne smiled, “Thanks Angel.” 

“No problem Daphne.”

Daphne didn’t speak for a few minutes, then she asked, “What time is it?”

Cassicy checked her phone, “It's 10:45.”

“I need to get home.”

“Did you walk here?” asked Cassidy leaning towards the window to find no car in the driveway. Daphne made a noise of affirmation, “kid, why don’t I walk you home? I’ve got a flashlight.”

“Are you sure?” she said, hand on the door handle.

“Yeah, I don’t mind,” Cassidy replied, quickly reaching into a cabinet full of loose batteries, old keys, matches, and… ah ha, a flashlight. She pressed the button, it flickered weakly so Cassidy struck the side of the flashlight once and it brightened considerably, which was good enough for Cassidy, “Come on, let's get a move on.”

She and Daphne walked in silence for a bit, only footsteps and the flickering flashlight made any sound, until finally Daphne spoke up.

“Angel? Have your parents ever met Ricky?” 

“Yes,” she replied, trying to keep her voice from making the startled sound that her brain had produced, “they did.”

“Did they like him?” she asked curiously, tilting her head slightly.

“My Momma did,”

“What about your Dad?”

“My Dad didn’t like Ricky.”

“How old were you when they met him?”

Cassidy briefly wondered whether she should be honest or not, before internally shrugging to herself, “I was maybe eight?”

Daphne’s head spun around and she nearly tripped on a crack in the sidewalk, this only made Cassidy laugh as she tried to suppress any panic that she might feel on accidentally subverting Daphne’s expectations, “How old did you think we were?”

“I thought you met when you were like sixteen!” she exclaimed, “how old were you when you started dating?”

“Sixteen?” 

“Wow! Have you guys been together this whole time?”

“Nah, we were on and off for a while,” meaning it had been complicated, it still was complicated, and it would remain complicated until the cursed treasure was found. They walked another block closer to the neighborhood that Daphne lived in.

“Does he live with you?”

“Nah, why do you ask?” Cassidy replied, trying to ignore how hot her face felt.

“He was there in the morning and the evening when we talked about the Darrow mansion, and he said he lives in Crystal Cove, so I just assumed…” she trailed off, and they stopped in front of Daphne’s house. She waved a goodbye and quickly ran inside.

Cassidy turned around and walked back as fast as she possibly could without running. 

She tried not to think as she hopped into bed and turned out the lights, but her thoughts circled around what Daphne had said, specifically about Ricky living with her. It had brought up something she had wondered; where does Ricky live? And while she joined all the rest of the sleeping residents of Crystal Cove in dreaming, she just kept wondering. Did he live somewhere in Crystal Cove? He had to, right? Unless he just lived near the farmers on the outskirts of the area. While possible, it just didn't seem his style.

It was the first thought in her head the next morning ‘He can’t live that far away.’ maybe twenty miles from Destroido tops. He seemed to always be at Destroido, and then, as she finished her first broadcast of the day, another thought occurred to her, making her stop in her tracks. ‘He doesn’t live at Destroido does he?’ she felt her heart almost drop out of her chest. Cassidy pressed a hand to her lip, her mind racing to find any other possibilities, but now that she thought about it, it made perfect sense. He’s always there no matter what time it is, he refuses to tell her where he lives, and all of his things are there. 

This thought immediately made her walk back into the soundbooth, where she changed some of the settings she had preset for the day. It changed from her broadcasting about ten times that day to her only needing to broadcast once more at night. She quickly darted back to her room, changing out of the green high waisted pants and crop top into a full black bodysuit, which admittedly was better suited for the night time, but it would work just fine with how dark the basement of Destroido was. 

  
  
  


It was easy sneaking past the guards and scientists. You really think that they’d learn from all the trial and error of her learning how to sneak in unseen. Cassidy had lost track of the times that Ricky had to personally get the guards to release her. But they never bothered to look up so she could just climb on the metal rafters and catwalks until she reached Ricky’s lair, which is what she did. This time, she even managed to evade Ed Machine. The cool metal door closed behind her as she crept into the room, crouched over and hidden. The sound of water splashing from the sharks in it and the whirl of machinery greeted her, as well as the taste of salt, and, the sound of breathing, almost lost in the variety of noises. She tiptoed near silently to see Ricky in his chair, the monitors on and displaying Crystal Cove in its entirety. However, as she walked closer, it became clear that he didn’t see any of it. She hadn’t spotted it right away, because of how Ricky’s long hair fell into his face, but even though his head was propped up on his fist, his eyes were screwed shut and his expression tight. 

“Ricky,” she said, hitting his shoulder softly, but that was more than enough. Eyes suddenly open and wide, he leapt from his seat, nearly toppling himself over in the process. He grabbed the seat rest with white knuckles, steadying himself. His tired eyes stared at her blankly through a curtain of messy hair.

“Cassidy,” he said finally, pushing his hair away from his eyes, “what’s the matter?”

“You live here don’t you?” 

“Did you really come all this way to ask me that?”

“Ricky, do you live down here?” 

“Angel, I already told youー”

“You told me that you wouldn’t tell me where you live, I know,” she interrupted, “you aren’t telling me, I’m guessing.” 

Ricky sighed, “why do you think I live at Destroido?”

“I have my reasons, but that’s besides the point because I’m right and you’re trying to redirect the conversation,” she stated, staring him dead in the eyes, he stared right back for about thirty seconds before he looked away.

“Fine, yes, I do live here,” Ricky said after a long pause, “there’s a room across from this one that I sleep in.”

“That can’t be good for you.”

“Who cares?”

‘I do’ though Cassidy, but she said instead, “you might sleep better if you actually had somewhere to live besides something straight out of the  _ Death Star. _ ”

“It’s  _ fine _ , Angel.”

“It’s not fine! Why are you doing this to yourself?”

“It’s just more efficient, that’s the only reason.”

“That’s not true, you can do almost all of your work remotely.”

“Where would I even go? An apartment? A house?” he replied, face twisting in disgust.

‘Hermit,’ was the word that came to mind, “how about literally anywhere that doesn’t have sharks twenty feet away from you as you sleep?”

“I have no desire toー”

“Stay with me,” Cassidy said which made Ricky pause.

“What?”

“I have a spare room that you can stay in,” she saw that Ricky looked as if he was about to protest, “Come on Ricky, you said so yourself, it doesn’t matter if Mystery Incorporated sees you.”

“Why?” 

“Because…” you overwork yourself, because that can’t possibly be healthy, because it’s cold down here? Cassidy searched her brain for any logical reason she could think of, “I’ll be able to watch your back, and besides,” she said quickly as Ricky opened his mouth, “why don’t we try it for a week?”

“A week?”

“Yeah, you live with me for a week and if you really prefer living down here, then I’ll never bring it up again.”

Ricky stared at the ceiling, lips pressed to his knuckles. He didn’t respond for a while until... “Fine.  Only  _one_ week.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried my best with this chapter, but honestly this is just mostly filler, it's not my best work, but I can't look at it for any longer or my head's going to explode. Next chapter will be easier for me to write so there's that at least. Also, thanks to Starryoak, who in one of their comments mentioned the fan theory that Fred is autistic, I looked the theory up afterwards, it makes sense and I like it.

Ricky had lived alone for all of his adult life. He had lived in random apartments in his early twenties while he started Destroido, but as soon as he had a building for it he stopped living in apartments and moved into the basement. He had never had an occasion to move out, that was the real reason he lived in Destroido. After all, where would he go? It wasn’t like he had any living family members that had been close to, Brad and Judy had disappeared completely, and Cassidy? He knew she’d have helped him, but at one point he was so certain that his best friend Pericles would never hurt him he would have staked his life on it. That made him want to prove that he could live by himself, that he didn’t need a guardian angel by his side, or a devil on his shoulder.

Once, when he had been exceptionally drunk, he had considered buying his parents home, after all, it had technically been left to him, however, Ricky had been missing, so it had been given to his father's cousin who lived in Kansas and never visited. He then considered buying it from his second cousin, it would be easy, after all, he owned a business, and a rather destructive one at that, it would be assumed that he’d use it for mining or something. But the thought of setting foot in his old home made him seize up, even in a state of nearly black out drunk, so what would he even use it for? Ricky pushed the thought out of his head as quickly as he possibly could, the way he did this was by drinking until he passed out. 

‘Why did I agree to this?’ he pondered while he packed some of his belongings into a random bag he had found in his basement at Destroido, which honestly, Cassidy’s  _ Death star _ assessment hadn’t been an inaccurate description with it’s metal walls, ceiling and floor, the bed was closer to a cot than an actual bed and could fold into the wall. He threw clothing into the bag carelessly, after all, he’d be back in a week, he placed his keytar into the bag as well, a comb that he had only used once, and other essentials. He added a tarp that had been used to cover a broken piece of equipment to the bag as well. He threw the bag over his shoulder and walked towards the door, then stopped midstep. He walked back to the wall, tapping the side twice so that red numbers lit up, he typed the passcode in and a small safe door swung open. The safe contained an album with pictures, several diaries, and a golden pin shaped like a magnifying glass with a question mark in the middle. Ricky considered for a moment if he should take anything, he sighed, typing in the passcode again, which loosened the safe from the wall, allowing him to seal the door shut and transport it into his bag. The door clicked shut behind him as he left. 

Ricky had specifically designed Destroido to be confusing as possible to navigate. All the hallways looked nearly identical, catwalks and metal beams that lead to nowhere, they twisted and turned seemingly at the whims of a mad man, this however, was calculated. If anyone were to ever break into Destroido and attempted to access the basement, it would be very difficult to do so unseen. Cassidy had been caught numerous times, and she snuck through the building on a near daily basis. 

Ricky was probably the only person who had seen every room in Destroido, well, Ed Machine had probably seen most of the rooms, but not all of them. Ricky turned a corner, and another, and another, past scientist working on animal hybrids and security guards going about their day. Until he got to the office section of Destroido. Ricky ignored the first three doors, finally pushing open the fourth door, which led to an office that had every paper in a neat stack, and, despite being used everyday, not a speck of dirt anywhere. 

“Sir?” asked Ed Machine, who had been sitting at his desk and going over documents sent from Quest industries.

“I came to inform you I won’t be in for a week, you can contact me over the phone if I am needed.”

“Yes sir.” he replied, and went back to reading the paperwork he had. 

With that out of the way, Ricky took the way out that had the least amount of people possible, even though it took him fifteen extra minutes. He had left the enigma engine in the back of Destroido, specifically because no one went back there. 

Ricky set his bag in the passenger's seat and started the van, not paying the world around him any particular attention he arrived at K-Ghoul within ten minutes. 

To his knowledge, the enigma engine couldn’t be connected to the original mystery incorporated. Not easily, at least, but just to be safe, he pulled into Cassidy’s driveway and drove the van behind the studio where she kept her motorcycle. Then, he pulled the tarp out of the bag and threw it over the top of the van so that it covered the words. Just to make sure the tarp wouldn’t blow away, Ricky closed two of the doors with the ends of the tarp stuck inside.

“You know that won’t stop them, right?” Cassidy called out, leaning out of a window she had been watching from.

“Can you think of a better solution, my dear Angel?” he asked, tugging the tarp a little so that it was easier to see the van, but not the letters, as to discourage the gang by not making the hidden van a complete mystery.

“Don’t you have another car?”

“No.” 

“I guess that works in that case,” she said, closing the window and walking away.

Satisfied that the van was hidden well enough, Ricky grabbed his bag and left the van so that he could scramble up the slight slope behind K-Ghoul to the opened front door where Cassidy was waiting. Ricky already knew where the guest room was, but Cassidy led him there anyway, through the hallway with bright paintings. She opened the door and walked in, Ricky right at her heel. Like the last time he had been here, it was a fairly plain room, the only furniture being a bed which currently had no blanket and a side table.

“Here,” she said while she watched him unpack almost curiously, then she added, “did you pack a blanket?”

Ricky really didn’t want to admit that he hadn’t, mostly because if he slept he slept in a cot with no blankets or pillows, but Cassidy wasn’t asking that question because she didn’t know, after all, it was a small bag and it’s content was fairly obvious, Ricky’s best guess at why she was asking was to see what he would respond with. Ricky didn’t respond to this inquiry, figuring that the best way to win this game was to stay quiet.

“Okay, guess you didn’t,” she disappeared into the hallway for a moment while Ricky set his keytar on the side table, “here, look.”

Ricky looked up to see her grasping a multi coloured blanket, purple and blue and black swirled in such a way that it looked like space. Cassidy threw it onto the bed, it landed in a crumpled heap of soft fabric and pretty colours.

“I meant to give you that a while back, it reminded me of you.”

“A nebula?” he replied, smoothing the fabric out with a hand.

“Yeah.”

“It’s beautiful.”

  
  
  
  
  


Daphne wasn’t the best at roller skating, but neither was Velma. This was the reason that Daphne tripped and almost pulled Velma to the ground with her. 

“You took skating lessons, why are you as bad at this as I am?” said Velma, using the wall to steady herself.

“I took lessons, I never said I was good at skating,” Daphne replied as she slowly drifted, unable to control her movements. Velma reached out and pulled her towards the wall.

“ Touché.”

Daphne pushed off the wall and unsteadily drifted, still keeping the wall in arms reach. She had been thinking about Angel’s advice since last night. It seemed like the best option, so now she just had to wait until her parents threw a party and invite Fred. Easy. Right.

“Velma, I was wondering,” she said as Velma caught up to her, making thumping and squeaking noises as she tried to skate without losing control, “my parents don’t like Fred.”

“...no kidding,” she replied in a tone that made it clear that fact was no surprise to her.

“I want to see if I can make them like Fred, or at least tolerate him.”

“How are you planning to do that?” The end of that sentence was ‘your parents hate Fred,’ but Velma didn't voice that thought.

“Well, I asked Angel last night and she said I should invite him to a party.”

“Hmmm, that’s not a bad idea, actually, at least a semi public location guarantees they can’t do anything too bad.”

“Would that work?”

“Maybe.”

“Maybe?” repeated Daphne anxiously, “why wouldn’t it work?”

“Your parents are a little…” Velma paused, pushing up her glasses, “unpredictable. It might work, I might not, it depends.”

Daphne decided that she’d invite Fred to a party that had at least five guests, if that was the thing stopping them from being hostile.

“You were at K-Ghoul last night?” asked Velma after a while.

“Mhhhm.”

“Was Angel’s friend there?”

“Ricky? No.”

“Does anything about him strike you as weird?”

“No,” exclaimed Daphne, “why do you say that?”

“It’s just that the way he and Angel act makes me think they've known each other for a long time,” Velma hesitated, then lapsed into silence.

“They  _ Have  _ known each other for a long time.”

“How do you know that?” Velma questioned before she hit her forehead with her palm, “wait, you asked last night?”

“Yeah, Angel said they’ve known each other since they were 8, and that they’ve been dating since they were 16!” she cried, taking her hand off the wall for a second to clasp her hands together, but then she started to drift towards the center, so she hastily grabbed the wall again.

“Doesn’t that strike you as weird?”

“What?”

“That he just showed up? We’ve known Angel for a long time but we never met him?”

“Maybe he’s just shy?” Daphne shook her head, “I don’t know, I think it’s sweet that Angel has someone.”

“Huh?”

“I don’t know, she doesn’t really seem to have a lot of friends, I just think she and Ricky are a cute couple,” Daphne remarked, shrugging.

Velma looked like she wanted to say something else, but didn’t. 

  
  


Fred didn’t see the world the same way that everyone else did, he had a particular way of thinking about people, and that was that he thought of them as traps. 

His Dad, Mayor Jones, was like a trap so complex that Fred couldn’t exactly predict what would happen when he pulled the lever, and while that made him anxious, he so desperately wanted that trap to work so that he would know for sure he wouldn’t have failed it.

Velma, sharp tongued, quick witted, socially and emotionally inept, was like a complicated steel trap that used metal wire to ensnare it’s victims, one that would take Fred hours to build and that would work 99% of the time, practical, but with its faults. After all sand caught in the metal gears would quickly subdue it until it could be cleared.

Shaggy, somehow both anxious and easygoing in equal parts, was like a trap made of rope and a cage. While the trap would look simple and laidback, it would also have to be tense and complex to work properly, but most people don’t look close enough at the cage and rope to see the complexities behind the simple exterior.

Scooby was like a hole in the ground full of hay, a seemingly goofy solution, but one that would always work because it was reliable.

Daphne, well, Fred wasn’t always sure with Daphne, but most days she was like a trap with springs, one that would shoot you into the sky so that you could see everything in existence so bright and bathed red in the light of the fading sun, and then you fall back down onto soft pillow.

Fred and the gang were at the roller skating place. Not for any particular reason, though Shaggy did mention that the food there was great. Daphne and Velma were roller skating, Scooby was at a table waiting for the waiter to bring nachos that Shaggy had bought, and Fred was content to play arcade games while Shaggy watched.

“Like, why is your aim so good?” said Shaggy while Fred was playing skeeball

“Oh, it’s because I’m good at figuring out how much force is needed to move something” replied Fred cheerfully as he tossed the ball through the air and sunk it into the 1000 point hole.

“Like Fred, just so you know I think you’re supposed to roll it,” said Shaggy, miming the action of rolling the ball, but it was too late because Fred had thrown the last ball into the hole, “or you could, like, keep doing it that way,” he finished, scratching his head. The skeeball machine spat out 25 tickets, which Fred shoved into his pocket.

Fred added two coins to the machine to start the game again, this time he rolled the ball, it still hit the 1000 points. 

“Hey, Shaggy, I thought you were grounded?”

After he asked that, Shaggy suddenly reminded Fred of a trap that clamps shut and traps the bad guy in darkness, “Like, my Mom and Dad are out of town, they, like, called earlier because they forgot about me,” 

Fred could hear something different in Shaggy’s voice, he just wasn’t sure exactly what it was. It was like his voice was somehow higher pitched and lower pitched at the same time and shifting between pitches too rapidly for either pitch to be detected. Fred didn’t know what to say, so instead of dwelling on it, Fred finished the game and placed the 25 tickets in his pocket.

“Like, the nachos are ready, I can smell them,” said Shaggy, who then proceeded to sprint and jump over the token machine.

Fred imputed two more coins, and the skee balls rolled back. He rolled it, he got a perfect score and 25 tickets again. Shaggy seemed… well, Fred didn’t have the language for it really, but he could identify that it was a vaguely negative feeling. Two more coins, and the game began again. 25 tickets and the game ended. He had won several games in a row.

Fred now had a lot of tickets, a sad friend, and no idea about what to do about said sad friend. Then he noticed something among the prizes that just might remedy at least one of the situations. After all, Mr. Trapples always made him feel better.

Fred approached the counter, which had one lady who looked to be in her mid thirties standing behind it.

“Excuse me?”

“Yes boy?”

“I’d like that stuffed animal,” he said, pointing at one in particular.

“That’s 250 tickets.”

Fred eagerly pulled all 300 tickets he had out of his pocket.

The lady nodded, reaching up to grab the small stuffed animal and shoving it into Fred’s arms.

Fred found where Shaggy and Scooby were still eating nachos. 

Shaggy looked up and noticed the small stuffed animal in Fred’s grasp “Is that, like, for Daphne?” 

“No,” Fred said, extremely surprised by the suggestion, “it’s for you, it looks like Scooby,” he explained, holding out the stuffed animal.

“It does look like me,” said Scooby, sniffing it.

Shaggy took the Scooby look alike from Fred with a “Like, thanks Freddy.” He held it to his chest and squeezed it. Scooby jumped up from his seat and into Shaggy’s free arm so that he could hug Shaggy. Fred didn't know how much he had helped, but Shaggy was smiling now.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I still think Daphne's a shipper.

A sound of pure terror and agony pierced through the air, something almost ancient and fearful. This sound that had been heard throughout history and predated humanity as a whole, this was the sound that woke Ricky up. Someone was screaming. This, waking up to screaming, was not unusual for him, not in the slightest, he woke himself up screaming all the time. For a second, Ricky didn’t know where he was, but it came rushing back to him, he was in Cassidy’s house, in the guest room, he had been there for two days. Ricky sat up so quickly his vision went fuzzy for a second as blood rushed from his head. He reached up to cover his mouth, to stop that terrified sound so that he wouldn’t wake Cassidy, only to realize that it wasn’t him making it.

Ricky threw aside the blanket and hurried to the door, opening it quietly only for the screaming to stop. Ricky held as still as he could manage, listening, silently. His hands shook as he tried to work out why Cassidy was screaming. His first thought was Professor Pericles, even though some part of him truly believed that he wouldn’t hurt his old friends, who else could it be? Maybe Brad and Judy? Possible, but unlikely; they had refused to come back to Crystal Cove for reasons that Ricky had yet to work out. Another terrifying answer came to mind, the Freak? The creature that had driven them out of Crystal Cove had never been caught. Ricky crept down the hallway slowly, holding his breath. 

Cassidy’s door swung open and slammed into the wall with a bang that shook the entire house, and Cassidy, tense and breathing hard, ran into the hallway at frightening speed. Ricky was almost knocked over when she ran into him, although this did nothing to slow her down, and if anything she ran almost impossibly faster. 

“Cassidy!” he called, he followed her as she disappeared into the main room where her sound booth was. Was someone chasing them? Ricky looked down the hallway, he saw and heard nothing but darkness and the footsteps of himself and Cassidy. What was Cassidy running from? 

By the time Ricky got to the main room, Cassidy had stopped running. She stood in the middle of the room, swaying from side to side.

“Cassidy?” Ricky asked in a half whisper.

She said nothing and gave no indication she had heard him. Ricky approached her slowly as it didn’t appear that either of them were in imminent danger. As he got closer to her, he observed two things that he hadn’t been able to see in the dark room from far away; her eyes were closed and tears were running down her cheeks. Ricky was about five feet away from her when she began screaming again, and she fell to the ground hard enough to make Ricky wince. 

Ricky dropped to his knees as she curled into an immobile ball on the ground.

“Cassidy?” he asked again, this time he tried to grab her shoulder but she pulled away from him. 

He really didn’t know what was wrong. Her breathing was harsh, but not as if she were ill, more like she was crying. She was curled up on the floor but she didn’t appear as if she were in physical pain. She didn’t seem to be conscious or at least not conscious enough to respond to him. So this left Ricky at a loss for what to do.

He didn’t have to do anything, it turned out, because after a couple of minutes Cassidy’s breathing slowed and she stopped crying. 

Ricky touched her shoulder, she didn’t reach much besides a quick intake of breath. He shook her gently.

“Hmmm?” she mumbled sleepily, eyes fluttering as she did. She closed her eyes again.

“Are you okay?”

“Mhhhm.” 

“You’re laying on your living room floor.”

“Mhhhmhm.”

“I shouldn’t leave you here.”

“Hmmhm.”

“I’m going to take you back to your room.” 

“Mhhm.”

Ricky maneuvered her so that he had one arm under her legs and another on her back, leaning her so that her head rested on his shoulder.

Cassidy was warm against his chest, which shouldn’t have surprised Ricky, who already knew that Cassidy felt warm, but it did. Ricky forgot how much he loved things like that sometimes, like how innocent Cassidy looked while she slept. ‘Like an angel’ he thought to himself. He had always thought that if there were ever such a thing as angels, Cassidy would be the closest a person could be to one. She mumbled something as he lifted her up and carried her back into her room, but by the time he placed her back on her bed she was already deep asleep.

Ricky couldn’t sleep that night, so he heard Cassidy when she woke up in the morning. This time there was no screaming and running. Ricky left the guest room after he heard her go into her soundbooth. 

Sure enough, by the time Ricky collapsed into one of the couches Cassidy was just leaving the soundbooth and stumbling back into the main room.

Cassidy tentatively sat in the seat next to him. Pressing a hand to her shoulder while she did.

“You look terrible, how’d you sleep?” she asked while she rubbed her eyes with her other hand. She looked exhausted, how must Ricky look then?

“Not well.”

“Me either.”

“I know.”

“How?”

“You screamed and ran down the hall last night.”

Cassidy’s eyebrows rose, “I did?” she leaned back in her seat and stared at the ceiling, “I… don’t remember that.”

Ricky rubbed the back of his neck, “You wouldn’t.”

“Why wouldn’t I?” she asked without looking away from the ceiling

“It’s uncommon for those with night terrors to remember them in the morning,” he replied, tilting his head to stare at her.

“I’m not sure that was a night terror.” 

“What was it then?” he challenged, “you’ve had night terrors before.”

“I’ve had them, but whenever I get night terrors, I wake up in the living room. I woke up in my bed,” she bit her lip but then she sighed, “maybe you’re right, I can’t think of what else that could be.”

“I took you back to your room.”

“Yeah, in that case you’re right, it was a night terror,” she said while she nodded, “I woke you up?”

“Yes.”

“Sorry ‘bout that.”

“Hmm.”

“Must have scared you.”

“Oh, I was certain we were both about to die,” he said casually, which made Cassidy laugh.

  
  


“Daphne, I have wonderful news!” was what Daphne’s Mom greeted her with. Wonderful new could mean many things when it came to the Blake family, Daphne just desperately hoped it wasn’t that her mother had found another blind date for her.

“Are you and Dad going on vacation?” said Daphne lamely, eye’s darting between her mother's gleeful expression and the letter in her hand.

Her Mother laughed, “Don’t be silly dear, you know vacations are a useless waste of time. No, Mayor Jones has asked us to host a party this Friday!” 

Daphne had been waiting for her mother to announce something like this, “Why?”

“A delegate from China is going to visit Crystal Cove!” 

“That’s great Mom, who are you inviting?”

“Well, Mayor Jones and the Delegateー”

“Can I Invite Fred!” interrupted Daphne much louder than she intended. 

Her mother's face twisted in displeasure, but then as she watched Daphne an expression Daphne couldn’t read passed over her face, “ As long as you bring your other friends too.” 

“Thank you!” she cried happily, rushing forward to tackle her mother in a hug, but running off before her mother could react. 

“Sometimes I just can’t understand that girl,” said Nan Blake to the empty room.

  
  


Daphne’s shoes made a dull thump on the ground as she shoved open the door to K-Ghoul with reckless abandon. Angel was nowhere to be seen, but Ricky, who was on his computer, jumped.

“Ricky!” said Daphne excitedly, “where’s Angel?”

Ricky silently pointed back at Angel’s bedroom. He hadn’t needed to though because she appeared in the doorway.

“Angel! My Mom’s hosting a party on behalf of Mayor Jones on Friday!” 

“And?” replied Angel encouragingly.

“Fred can come!” she paused as a look of contemplation crossed her face, “but I have to invite other friends.”

“That's the best case scenario. You’ll have support if the gang is there.”

“Can you come?” Daphne asked Angel, then quickly addressed Ricky too, “you can come too.”

“You sure that’s a good idea baby?”

“Yes, I’m sure,” Daphne answered with a smile, “my Mom asked me to bring friends!”

“She definitely meant the gang.”

“She didn’t say the gang, she said my friends.”

“Child, she definitely didn’t mean ‘go invite the DJ and her antisocial boyfriend who are both twenty years older than you.’”

“She didn’t say that, she said invite friends, if she only wanted me to invite the gang she should have said so,” replied Daphne, “please? I know you guys probably have plans but it’d really mean a lot to me if you came.”

“Oh,” Angel muttered with a sigh, she looked at Ricky who had been watching this entire exchange pensively. Angel and Ricky stared at each other for a moment, then Ricky shrugged. Angel turned back to Daphne, “yeah, we’ll be there.”

“Thanks Angel,” she said with a grin, then her smile widened, “I have to go tell the gang!”

  
  


Cassidy watched Daphne sprint out of K-Ghoul just as fast as she ran in. She disappeared just as quickly.

“What have we gotten ourselves into?” Cassidy said to herself.

“A dinner party, I believe,” Was Ricky’s answer as he went back to whatever he was working on on his computer, “her parents are Nan and Barty Blake, we knew them.”

“I mean, it’s not like the Blakes will recognize us.”

“No, and even if they suspected, they wouldn’t say anything, I’m not worried about the Blakes.”

“What  _ are  _ you worried about?”

“Guess.”

“Fred Jones senior.”

“Correct.”

“He didn’t recognize us when he saw us last time.”

“He wasn’t paying attention.”

“It’ll be fine.”

“What makes you think that?”

“No one has recognized me and I’ve been DJing at public venues for the last five years.”

“Fair point.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t wear that shirt though.”

“I like this shirt.”

“I know, but you’ve worn the same type since we were 6.”

“You aren’t going to wear green then?”

Cassidy tugged at her green crop top, “I guess we’ll both have to wear something formal.”

“I don’t own any formal clothing.”

“I don’t have anything that isn’t green.”

Ricky sighed, setting the computer aside as he stood up, “in that case we both need to go shopping.”

  
  


Cassidy had some formal clothes, but all of them were green. Just as Ricky had other shirts but none of them were formal. Cassidy pulled a dark blue dress from a rack. It was knee length and had a collar that went 75% around the neck then stopped just before the left collar bone. The second dress she looked at was a lacy lavender coloured dress with bell sleeves. Neither one was her style but that was kind of the point. She walked over to where Ricky was looking at a white button up shirt. 

“Have you found something?”

“I’m going to try these two on,” Cassidy answered, holding out the two dresses for Ricky to see.

He nodded, showing her the button up shirt he was considering, “I’ll do the same.”

They found the dressing room with no problems, except for the fact that there was only one dressing room. It wasn’t much of a problem though because the dressing room was big enough for both of them to stand in it and it had a seat. Cassidy sat down while Ricky buttoned up the shirt he had. It was purple with black buttons and dotted with black stars. 

“Purple?” she asked while he examined himself in the mirror.

“Not really my colour.” He replied while he started to unbutton the shirt.

“I was gonna say it looks good on you.”

Ricky tugged his yellow striped shirt back over his head, “It’ll work.”

“My turn I guess?” asked Cassidy as she stood up from the chair. Pressed against Ricky as he took the seat she had just abandoned. 

Cassidy grabbed the dark blue dress first, slipping it over the clothes she was already wearing. It was an uncomfortable fabric, and the collar hurt. She looked at it in the mirror. It wasn’t bad, but Cassidy didn’t like how it looked.

“No,” Cassidy decided, quickly pushing the fabric over her head and placing it to the side. She grabbed the lavender dress next. It also wasn’t her style, but it was nice. She could see her dark skin through the lace in the sleeves which came down to her fingertips. She twisted to the side, the skirt twirled pleasantly around her shins. She glanced at Ricky out of the corner of her eyes, he stared at her almost slack jawed. His face quickly went expressionless when Cassidy turned to look at him.

“Well?”

“You look nice.”

“Thanks.”


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love music, always have, always will. I think that 'Little Talks' by Of Monsters and Men is a good Ricky/Cassidy song. And "Little Lion Man" by Mumford and Sons works perfectly for Ricky after Cassidy dies.

The first time Ricky remembered attending a dinner party was when he was 7 and a half. He hadn’t wanted to come but his father made him. His father, his mother and him, had been invited by the owner of the only airport in Crystal Cove, Mr. Flanagan. Ricky’s father was the only  aircraft maintenance technician in Crystal Cove, the only other people the airport owner invited were the two pilots and their families.

He had asked if he could stay home with Pericles. His parents said no. Then his mother explained to him that the pilots and the airport owner’s children would be there and that he could play with them.

They arrived at the house and Mr. Flanagan shooed him off into a different room where the first pilot's son, the second pilot's daughter, and Mr. Flanagan’s daughter were playing.

The red headed girl was playing pretend tea party complete with actual glasses and a real tea pot. The ginger boy seemed slightly disinterested. The blonde haired girl made a face at the boy. They looked up when Ricky stumbled in with Pericles on his shoulder.

That was the day he met Brad Chiles, Judy Reeves, and Nan Blake, whose maiden name was Flanagan.

This was also the day that Ricky learned that pillows can hurt if they’re thrown at your head hard enough, the german phrase for ‘stupid children’ is ‘dumme Kinder’, children have strong bites, and Brad and Judy are brilliant at improvisation. 

All in all a very interesting day.

Ever since that incident Nan, and by extension, Barty, despised Brad and Judy with a passion. Nan pointedly ignored Ricky though. 

This was probably to Ricky’s benefit, she never bothered him again. She also wouldn’t recognize him. 

He hadn’t known Fred Jones senior for long when he was younger, but he thought that he was more likely to notice that something was amiss than the Blakes, but he hadn’t recognized Cassidy yet so it was unlikely that he’d recognize them tonight.

Ricky looked in the mirror in the bathroom and tried to see himself from an outsider's perspective. He wasn’t wearing his normal shirt so that as an identifier was out. His shoes and pants weren’t particularly noteworthy so that didn’t really matter. 

Cassidy walked past the mirror to get to a drawer that she kept her makeup in. She had already put on the dress she had bought yesterday. She was absolutely stunning, her curly ebony coloured hair that she kept as an afro forming almost a halo around her head because the tiny curls caught the light in just the right way that she looked like she had captured all of the stars in the sky in her curls. Her dark eyes complemented this well, with all of the intensity of a black hole, and almost as time stopping.

She also blended in well, despite that in Ricky’s opinion she could outshine the sun itself. He looked too much like himself, but he wasn’t sure exactly what it was about him that made him think he’d be recognized. Cassidy finished reapplying her makeup and looked over at him. She watched his face for a moment.

“It’s your hair.”

“What?”

“Your hair,” Cassidy started as she moved to stand behind him, “you have that cowlick.”

She was right, he’d had the cowlick since he could remember. He smoothed the offending lock of hair, it immediately shot back into place “It’s genetic, how do you suggest I hide it,” he said, immediately frustrated.

“Okay okay, hold on a sec,” she replied as she reached into a drawer near the mirror and pulled out a thin brown metal pin. She pinned Ricky’s stubbornly uncooperative lock of hair to his head.

“How’s that?” asked Cassidy as she stepped back to look over his shoulder to see him in the mirror. 

“It’ll work.”

“In that case we better get a move on.”

“I’m driving,” said Ricky without thinking.

“We can’t drive the enigma engine.”

“Then I’m calling Ed Machine to pick us up,” replied Ricky as he tried to avoid the obvious solution.

“We could take my motorcycle.”

“No, absolutely not.”

“What? You're scared?”

“No.”

“Then let's just take the motorcycle.”

“Why not call Ed Machine?”

“What if the kids see him?”  
“I’m sure we could come up with a reason.”

“Or we could just ride the motorcycle and avoid suspicion?”

“Why don’t we just walk?”

“Two reasons and you’re the one who brought up our little bird problem.”

“What’s the second?”

“We’ll be late if we walk,” she said as she checked the time, Ricky opened his mouth to protest more, Cassidy held up a hand and rolled her eyes, “Ricky, just trust me, I’m a good rider and we won’t go over thirty.”

Why Cassidy had two helmets when she had been the only person riding her motorcycle Ricky didn’t know, but she did have two helmets. Ricky was regretting that he hadn’t had Ed drive them and just drop them off a few blocks away, but it was too late now. Cassidy sat down first, readjusting her dress so that it wouldn’t blow around, then Ricky sat behind her gingerly, unsure exactly how he was supposed to adjust himself.

“Hold on to me and don’t wriggle around or it’ll make it harder for me to steer,” said Cassidy as she grabbed Ricky’s hands and directed them to her waist, he quickly wrapped his arms around her. Satisfied that that would suffice, she started the bike and turned out of the driveway. Ricky, surprised by how fast the bike felt even at less than 25 miles per hour, buried his head in Cassidy’s shoulder blades.

Ricky tried to ignore it and did successfully until the bike came to a screeching halt in front of a mansion. He lifted his head at the last minute which unfortunately meant his head jerked forward and his helmet hit Cassidy’s.

“Ah, sorry.”

“Don’t worry ‘bout it.”

Ricky dismounted then Cassidy did. She kicked the kickstand in place first.

“Ready?” she asked, pulling the helmet from her head and placing it on the seat.

“I hope so,” he replied, following suit just as the mystery machine pulled up behind them. Fred, Velma, Shaggy, Scooby, and a girl wearing a green hat and dress got out of the van. 

“Hey Angel, Ricky,” said Fred cheerfully, “I didn’t know Daphne invited you.”

“Hey baby,” replied Cassidy, surprising Shaggy who hadn’t been paying the slightest bit of attention while he talked to the girl with the green hat.

“Oh, Mai Le, this is Angel Dynamite, she runs K-Ghoul,” said Velma, gesturing to Cassidy as they all walked towards the mansion doors.

“Nice to meet you, Mai Le,” said Cassidy

“And this is Ricky, he has selective mutism so he can’t talk.”

“Nice to meet you both,” said Mai Le.

Fred knocked on the door. It swung open even before he pulled his fist away. Daphne grabbed his arm and pulled him into the house. Velma audibly sighed and followed after. Shaggy, Scooby, and Mai Le trailed after Velma, so Cassidy and Ricky walked in.

Daphne closed her eyes and inhaled deeply before she spoke, “Thanks for coming guys.”

A chorus of ‘no problems’ and’ it’s like all good’ followed. 

“The delegate from china and Mayor Jones are already here, so please follow me.”

Daphne led them through the grand high ceiling hallways into a dining room with a chandelier. Ricky took Cassidy’s hand without thinking about it, she squeezed it gently, as if to prove to him that she is still with him. 

The dining room had 16 seats, 8 of which were occupied. Barty Blake and the delegate from China sat at the head and the tail of the table respectively, Nan sat to the side of Barty and Mayor Jones sat to the other side of Barty. The Blake daughters sat to one side of the table next to an empty chair. Daphne herded Velma into a chair next to her sisters, then she put Cassidy in the chair next to Mayor Jones. Then she put Ricky across from Cassidy in the chair next to Nan Blake, Fred went next to Ricky, Daphne next to Fred, then Shaggy, then Scooby, then Mai Le.

With the seating settled, and Ricky unable to talk, he just listened to what everyone else was talking about. Or at least that was his plan.

“Oh,” said Nan Blake in a way that made it very clear she didn’t know what to say to Ricky, “what’s your name?” 

“That’s Ricky, Mom.”

“Why isn’t he speaking?” she said with a touch of displeasure.

“He can’t.”

“Oh dear.”

“So,” said Mayor Jones from across the table loudly enough to catch Ricky’s attention although he wasn’t speaking to him, “you’re the DJ who runs that radio station?” he finished as he addressed Cassidy. 

“Yeah, the name’s Angel Dynamite,”

“I meant to hire you a couple of weeks ago,” he exclaimed while making wild hand gestures. 

“At  _ my _ parties we hire live music,” interjected Nan Blake.

“That’s nice, Mrs Blake, but  _ I _ think it’s best to support local music,” said Mayor Jones with a thin smile.

“Well,  _ I  _ believe that nothing could be better than live musicians, Mayor Jones, unfortunately, Crystal Cove is lacking in that department,” claimed Nan Blake with a drawn out sigh.

“Flying fish food, Mrs. Blake, you should have asked me, there's plenty of underappreciated talents in Crystal Cove,” said Mayor Jones with narrow eyes and a cheshire cat grin.

“I’ve often found that ‘underappreciated’ is synonymous with, well, ‘substandard’ quite frankly.”

“Maybe you aren’t listening closely enough, Mrs. Blake.”

“I have good ears, Mayor Jones.”

“Heracules’s heel, listening and hearing are different things, Mrs. Blake.”

“Are you implying my wife doesn’t know that,” asked Barty as he took a brief break from glaring at Fred Jones junior to glare at Fred Jones senior.

“No, Mr. Blake, I’m only saying that having good ears has nothing to do with music.”

“Music is subjective,” interrupted Cassidy finally, “maybe you just have different tastes.”

“Good point!” cried Mayor Jones who pointedly stopped talking.

Nan turned to look at Cassidy, “Oh dear, that’s not to say that I think you're untalented!”

“That’s alright Mrs. Blake, I figured you wouldn’t be a fan of my style.”

Mayor Jones, never one to remain quiet for long, look across the table. His face immediately made the same fake smile he had used on Nan Blake and every other citizen in town. 

“I’ve never met you before, I’m Mayor Jones,” he reached across the table to shake hands, which Ricky reluctantly shook. Mayor Jones stared at Ricky with a bored look. His smile dropped a little as he continued to stare.

“What’s your name, sir?” Mayor Jones asked, smiling just as widely as he had a moment before. Ricky couldn’t do anything but stare, so that is what he did.

“You look familiar, I just can’t place it though,” Mayor Jones said finally, still staring. Ricky idly wondered how badly his face must hurt from pretending to smile so often.

“That’s unlikely, Mayor,” said Cassidy, “he just moved here,” 

“Do you know this man, Miss Dynamite?” asked Mayor Jones, finally looking away from Ricky.

“All my life, Mayor,” she said, winking at Ricky.

“Oh, are you two married?” asked Nan Blake, jumping back into the conversation.

Cassidy made a startled noise, Ricky, hardened by years of suppressing emotion under fake apathy and real bitterness, managed to not react for the most part, aside from his eyes widening a little.

“Mom!” said Daphne upon over hearing that remark, “they aren’t married.”

“How would you know darling, have you ever asked?” 

Daphne rolled her eyes, but didn’t argue. She went back to talking to Fred.

“Darling, they aren’t wearing wedding rings,” interjected Barty Blake.

“Neither are you, darling,” pointed out Nan Blake.

“Well, I’m not overly fond of jewelry, Nan.”

“They might not like jewelry either.”

“You are aware that they are still sitting right in front of you,” said Mayor Jones tiredly.  
“Oh, sorry Mrs. Dynamite,”

“We aren’t married,” said Cassidy finally.

“I’m sorry to assume!” cried Nan Blake quickly, “I merely thought that you must be, considering how, well, intimate, you seemed when you drove in!”

“Intimate?”

“He was holding your waist,” Nan Blake answered, “that seems rather indicative of closeness.”

It was then that Barty saved Cassidy from having to continue that conversation as he stood and tapped his glass, “Mr. Wang, friends, Fred,” he said, pausing again to glare at Fred, “I would just like to sayー” and then, all the lights in the room went out at the same time, plunging them into darkness, “who turned out the lights?”

Red electricity sparked and shot around the room, knocking over a vase on the table and frightening Scooby so much so that he fled from the chair. Smoke formed above the red electricity and Mr. Wang and Mai Le ran for cover as well.

Something, or rather someone, descended from the smoke, a man, dressed in red and white. Everyone had jumped from their seats at this point as the man hovering in the air finally spoke.

“Do not disturb the dragon’s heart or you will pay the price…” the man continued his spiel and shot red electricity at everyone who was even remotely close to him. Everyone quickly ducked under the table. 

“What is the dragon's heart?” Velma muttered, then the man sent the table flying across the room. 

Fred ran across the room and pulled a rope that seemed to be attached to the curtains. It sent a statue head flying at the hovering man, but it swung past him and broke through the wall which sent a net flying down. The man disappeared from the air and the net fell, trapping the occupants of the room in it.

Ricky quickly pushed the net over his head and away from him. He had the benefit of being the test subject of Brad and Judy’s shenanigans for years and was the first to untangle himself from the net.

Ricky caught Cassidy’s eyes. He could almost hear what she was thinking.

‘That didn’t go as expected.’

Everyone freed themselves from the net, but Fred clearly hadn’t won any favours with Daphne’s parents. Everyone started to leave, except for mystery incorporated.

“Maybe we should just look for clues?” said Velma, trying to stop Daphne from scolding Fred.

“Good idea,” said Scooby, immediately sniffing the ground until he sneezed.

“What’d you find Scoob?” asked Shaggy, scratching his head.  
“It’s some kind of red dust.”

“That’s not dust, it’s tea scarlet oolong to be exact. This tea is very rare,” mentioned Mai Le.

“And flammable.”

“I only know one place in Crystal Cove that specializes in rare flammable tea,” said Fred, “and that’s Chen’s coffee.”

“Then let’s go,” said Velma, gesturing for everyone to follow her. Shaggy, Scooby, Fred, Daphne, Mai Le, and her left.

“That went well,” muttered Ricky to Cassidy.

“They’ll work it out.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“They’re good kids,” she said as she watched them drive away. She had nothing but certainty in her eyes.

“Hm.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My take on Ricky and Cassidy as a couple is that they both love each other, but the curse tore them apart. I get the impression from the show that love make the entity less able to effect things.  
> Also, just so I'm clear, I didn't like Shaggy and Velma as a couple, but I don't really think anyone else did either. I think Shaggy was owed an apology by Velma and Scooby.

  
  


The mystery of the two wizards and the dragon’s heart was over and the dragon's heart had been recovered from Barty and Nan Blake’s boat. With Mai Le trapped in a net, they turned her over to the sheriff when they got back to the shore. 

“What have you kids done now?” said Sheriff Bronston Stone blankly, as he always did whenever they solved a case. He listened to their explanation, which was backed up by Daphne’s parents, and, after a phone call with Mr. Chen. It proved that mystery Incorporated had done nothing he could arrest them for, so he shooed them away with an annoyed “that’s enough from you kids tonight, go home,” as Mai Le got into the backseat. Daphne, who normally would have ridden back in the mystery machine, made to leave with her parents at their insistence.

Fred and Daphne were too busy saying their goodbyes to care about the sheriff’s antagonistic attitude towards them, and Velma was busy pretending not to notice that the liquid on Shaggy’s cheeks wasn’t seawater. The sheriff's car sped away, quickly disappearing from view in the dark. The Blake’s weren’t far behind them. That left Fred, who was extremely pleased with himself as he had just gotten Daphne’s parents to not despise him for two seconds, Velma, who was uncertain, Shaggy, who had his back turned to everyone else, and Scooby, who watched Shaggy with a tilted head.

Velma was bad with feelings, she knew this. Fred was also bad at feelings, but he was bad in the opposite way. Velma was better at interpreting feelings than Fred, she just couldn’t properly express her feelings. Fred wore his heart on his sleeve, but often couldn’t interpret what he was feeling.

This was why Velma said nothing as she got into the passenger's seat next to Fred, and she said nothing as they drove towards Shaggy’s house, and she only responded with the bare minimum amounts of communication as Fred happily talked.

“I really think that Daphne’s parents are impressed!” 

“Yeah, I’m sure.”

“They liked my trap!”

“They sure did,” until they got caught in one but that's besides the point.

“And they…”

“Shaggy, Scooby, we’re on your street,” said Velma without looking behind her.

She heard and felt the van slow to a stop, the metal doors of the mystery machine open and then shut without a goodbye. 

The van began moving again.

Velma had a sinking feeling, she didn’t want to look back, she didn’t want to think about Shaggy's misery anymore, but she found images of Shaggy’s face the moment he realized Mai Le never loved or even liked him to begin with flashing through her head anyway.

Isn’t this karma? She should be happy that Shaggy understood how it felt to have the person who liked you not like you back? 

The part of Velma that she kept locked in the back of her mind reminded her that she wasn’t sure she had really liked Shaggy or if she had just convinced herself she did. 

Velma ignored that part of her.

Of courses she had liked Shaggy, she dated him didn’t she? Velma didn’t know, she didn’t really understand how she felt.

After all, Velma was always naturally logical inclined, and feelings were never very logical. ‘The heart wants what it wants’ or at least that’s what Velma had heard, but she was never quite sure what her heart had wanted. Maybe that’s why she had asked Shaggy out. If life was a movie, or a book, what would logically follow a group with two boys and two girls is they would start dating. Daphne liked Fred, and Fred liked Daphne. Shouldn’t Shaggy like Velma and Velma like Shaggy?

Velma didn’t understand why it hadn’t worked. Following the pattern that the media and life in general had laid out she should have had feelings for Shaggy! But she didn’t. She hadn’t. Why hadn’t she?

“Here’s your stop!” 

“Thanks Fred,” said Velma, climbing out of the van. She didn’t want to wake up her parents so she held her breath and tried to keep the noise to a minimum.

“Earth to Velma, you still there, baby?” said Angel's kind voice while she waved a hand in front of Velma’s vacant expression.

Velma nearly jumped, “just thinking.”

“No kidding, your friends left nearly half an hour ago.”

Velma looked around, sure enough, just her and Angel.

“I know it’s not my business, but if somethings eating at you, you can talk to me.”

“I would, but I’m not so sure you can help,”

“Would it happen to be the same thing that had Shaggy not eating?”

“Same circumstance, different feelings,” Velma sighed, there was no way that Angel could possibly make this worse, “how are you at emotional intelligence?”

“Not great, to be honest with you.”

“Let me rephrase that. Is your emotional intelligence any better than mine?”

“Well, you're 15, so probably.”

“I- ugh, I don’t know, it just doesn’t make sense.”

“Girl, you have a talking dog for a friend, nothing makes sense, what specifically ‘doesn’t make sense’?” 

“Shaggy! We should have worked!”

“What, you guys dating?”

“Yes, it makes sense,” Velma pushed up her glasses.

Angel started laughing, “Oh Velma, baby, no, did you go out with Shaggy just because it made sense?”

“Yes, why is that so funny?”

“Did you like Shaggy?”

“Yes.”

“In a romantic sense?”

Velma couldn’t answer that, in all honesty, she made a noncommittal noise, but Angel seemed to understand anyway.

Angel stopped laughing and a serious look settled on her face, “Look, Velma, you can’t just _make_ yourself love someone, or not love someone, just because it would be convenient,” Angel said with a sad smile, “the world would be too simple if that was how it worked.”

There was some kind of undertone there, Velma ignored it.

Why? Why? Why? So many whys Velma didn’t have answers for. She was worried about Shaggy. 

‘Are you doing okay?’ was what she texted him without really thinking about it. Exhaustion mixed with anxiety is never a good thing.

‘I’m okay,’ was the response that was texted right away, then her phone rang.

“Shaggy?” said Velma, answering immediately.

“Like, was I a bad boyfriend?” said Shaggy in a strained voice that broke halfway through talking

“Noー”

“Because like Mai Le pretended to like me, and you like, got mad at me and like, so did Scoobー”

“Norville!” she said in a whisper shout, which was loud enough to stop his rambling, “look, Mai Le, she didn’t like you because she was using you, that wasn’t on you.”

“But, like, you and me, we didn’t work out andー”

“I was mean to you, Shaggy,”

“Like, you weren’tー”

“I was,” interrupted Velma, “don’t try and excuse my behaviour.”

“I, like, didn’t do what you wanted.”

“That wasn’t an excuse, we wanted different things, so I was mean.”

“Scoob didn’t exactly act, like, nice.”

“He shouldn’t have done that either.”

“But, he’s like my best friend.”

“You don’t belong to him, you didn’t belong to me either, it was wrong of me to try and make you pick one of us,” she took a deep breath, “I’m sorry.”

Shaggy didn’t speak for a moment, “I, like, like you and Scoob, you guys are my best friends.”

“I think I’m glad we aren’t dating, not because you were a bad boyfriend, you and I just aren’t right for each other, we work better as friends.”

“I, like, like being your friend.”

“You’re a good friend too, Shaggy,” said Velma, and everything was not okay again, Velma was still confused, and Shaggy was still heartbroken. But for the first time since she and Shaggy started dating, she felt like she had her friend back, and unbeknownst to Velma, for the first time since Mai Le left, Shaggy genuinely smiled.

  
  
  


Brad and Judy. Judy and Brad. 

They hadn’t been back to Crystal Cove in 18 years. Not since their only son was taken. They were Brad and Judy Sternum now, but the names didn’t really matter. They would always be Brad Chiles and Judy Reeves.

Brad and Judy Sternum, the perfect couple. Perfectly in love, perfectly happy, perfectly in sync, perfect coworkers and co owners. Perfection caught in a locket and frozen in time.

Brad Chiles and Judy Reeves, 40% of mystery Incorporated, but might as well have been 25%, high school sweethearts, oh the rumours that Crystal Cove high had come up with about them. There were rumors of them dating years before they even turned 10. Those meddling children who ruined business for no good reason. The little demons who destroyed everything. Troublesome little imps who bit off more than they could chew.

Brad and Judy, because when was the last time it was Brad without Judy, or Judy without Brad?

Most of their old life had been left behind, but it always was and would always remain Brad and Judy.

Judy was the one to check their email and see that they had received a message from Mr. E. Judy knew who it was, she would have known who it was even if she had never heard that name or seen his email. Cassidy’s greatest mystery was always Ricky, after all. He had asked them to come back to Crystal Cove a while ago. They declined, and had no reason to explain why. Angel Dynamite accepted.

“Brad, we have an email,” said Judy as Brad used both hands to tie a net to a wire connected to the rafters of the building they were currently in.

“From who, Judy?”

“Our old friend, Mr. E.”

“Could you read it for me, Judy?”

“Of course, Brad.”

“Thank you Judy.”

“You’re welcome, Brad,” she replied, then turned her attention back to the email, “‘Brad and Judy. I know you have decided against returning to Crystal Cove, that is not what this is about. I will not be attempting to persuade you, however, it is relevant to my current interests to know exactly why you declined my request. I assumed it was because you were not interested in keeping the current mystery incorporated from making our mistakes, or maybe you turned a new leaf and no longer care about finding the treasure. I believe the former is true, but it seems unlikely to me that the latter is also true as you run a trap making company. In addition, you were recently spotted at the Burlington library, specifically looking for books on the conquistadors. My regards, Mr. E.’”

“Insightful,” muttered Brad, twisting a rope in a slightly different way than he had been doing a moment before.

“He’s still Ricky, that’s for sure,” answered Judy.

“Do you thinkー”

“ーwe should tell him?”

“I thinkー”

“ーnot,” finished Judy, “he’ll figure it out on his own,” Brad nodded in agreement, “I’ll send an email backー”

“ーbut don’t add any useful information.”

  
  


In the guest room, Ricky had been working on a design of a genetic experiment Destroido was going to run. It involved animals and why some of them had the ability to talk. He flipped the program he was using with his keyboard to check the dimensions of the metal wire he was working on when the email icon beeped and added an unread email. Ricky saved the changes to the program, then clicked the email icon. He had received a response from Brad and Judy Sternum. Ricky wasn’t expecting much to come from it, in fact he hadn’t even expected an email back at all. Ricky cursed under his breath as he read the response he got from Brad and Judy. 

‘Hello, Mr. E. Sorry to say, we aren’t really able to explain our reasoning. At the moment we have more pressing matters to attend to. We will return when we are ready. Sincerely, Brad and Judy.’

It was completely useless, in fact it was worse then Brad and Judy ignoring him because at least then he wouldn’t have gotten his hopes up. He cursed again, and closed the email. What did Brad and Judy think they were playing at? They were very clearly still treasure hunting, so why were they staying away? It didn’t make sense, and it was very clear to Ricky that he was missing something. What? What could he possibly be missing? 

Ricky supported his chin on his fist as he tried to think of any reason that Brad and Judy might avoid Crystal Cove.

They didn’t want to be involved in the treasure? Laughable, there was no way that they didn’t want to solve the mystery of the cursed treasure.

Were they working for Professor Pericles? Unlikely, and not really Pericles style to have such idiotic minions, but he had done so in the past.

Had Pericles threatened them? Also unlikely, Pericles probably didn’t see them as a threat so he wouldn’t have bothered.

Were they afraid of the Freak? Possible, but the Freak had threatened their families, and Brad and Judy’s families had left Crystal Cove, so the Freak would have no one left to threaten.

Ricky felt as if he was missing something very obvious and it was infuriating him. He pushed the computer away with a barely controlled rage. Then he pulled out his keytar and hit a chord with loud precision. 

He continued to mull over the enigma that was Brad and Judy.

It was possible that they just didn’t want to work with Cassidy and him. They had made their dislike of Cassidy and Ricky very clear. 

It was also possible that they wanted to find the treasure by themselves, but Ricky had better resources. So that would beg the question of how they could possibly believe they could beat Ricky. 

What was it that they said in the email? ‘We will return when we are ready.’ They didn’t deny that they were still looking for the pieces of the planispheric disk, or the cursed treasure. That implied that they were biding their time or that they couldn’t return at the moment. Which brought him back to his original idea that they were either planning something or they were being threatened. It also meant this line of thinking was circular and useless. 

“I shouldn’t have even bothered with them.”

“Who?” said Cassidy's voice from behind him.

Ricky turned his head enough to see that she was leaning on the doorframe, “Brad and Judy.”

“You wanted to know why they won’t come back?”

“Yes, I can’t understand it.”

“I can,” said Cassidy, frowning, “I forgot you didn’t know.”

“It’s very clear I’m missing something, care to fill in the gaps?”

“Okay, okay,” replied Cassidy, walking further into the room and sitting on the bed so that she was next to the chair he was sitting in, “you remember that year where you didn’t contact anyone?”

“Yes,” one year after they had been forced from Crystal Cove, Ricky had been busy with his company, so he neglected to check in with anyone for about a year, once he finally decided to do so, Cassidy had been furious.

“They had a kid that year.”

“What?”

“Yeah, a son,” Cassidy said with a bittersweet smile, “nice kid, as far as babies go.”

“They don’t have a son.”

“Not anymore, they were stupid, they came back here.”

Ricky had a terrible feeling he knew how this story was going to end, “what happened to their son?”

“The Freak stole him, said that he’d only be safe if they never came back.”

“No wonder they stay away.”

“Yeah.”

“But that won’t keep them away forever.”

“No, it won’t, and I’m worried about what they’ll do to the new mystery incorporated.”

“They won’t do anything rash,” after all, Brad and Judy built traps for a living, they could be patient.

“I know, but what _will_ they do?” said Cassidy tiredly, “don’t underestimate them, they know what they’re doing.”

“For now, they aren’t doing anything, and we will know when they are, don’t worry, Angel,” Ricky would never admit it, but he hated to see that look in her eyes, the same look that she used to get when they were kids, and Ricky, ever the clumsy boy, would trip himself up running, or he’d climb something high and fall. Her eyes, all panic and fear, often swam through his thoughts and even though Ricky didn’t know it, his nightmares, “speaking of patience, it’s been a week.”

Cassidy paused, “does that mean you’re going back?”

“I said I would stay for a week,” 

“I’d be sad to see you go.”

“You’ll still see me,” he said, staring straight into her eyes.

“Still,” said Cassidy, staring right back at him.

Ricky and Cassidy didn’t say anything for a minute, as if trying to outlast the other. 

Finally, Cassidy broke eye contact and shook her head, “Oh, whatever, I don’t _need_ you to stay.”

“Yes, I know, so why are we stillー”

“But I want you to stay,” she said, pushing herself up to stand up, Ricky followed suit. Cassidy was tall, but Ricky was still half a head taller, “I’ve _missed_ you, Ricky.”

“You’ve seen me everyday for the last five years.”

“No, Ricky, I’ve seen the CEO of destriodo every day for the last five years,” she replied, her expression falling into an almost painful frown, she took a step forward, “I’ve seen the CEO of destroido, hidden underground in a metal cage of his own design surrounded by sharks and his own self pityー”

“Hey!”

“ーI’ve seen Ricky Owens more times in the last few weeks than I have in yearsー” she said, the look

“Angelー”

“And I’ve missed you! You have no idea how much I missed that boy I fell in love with so long ago.”

“Well, what if I’m not Ricky Owens anymore!” he shouted, “what if I”m just Mr. E now?” he took a step towards her, his little angel, “what if Ricky Owens died, and I’m all that’s left! What will you do when Mr. E inevitably disappoints you because he is not Ricky Owens?”

“I’m not Cassidy Williams anymore either Ricky! I’m not her because I can’t be! Because too much has happened! Too much for me to be just Cassidy, or for me to be just Angel. Does that disappoint you!?” she screamed back, refusing to back down, “I can love Mr. E, because no matter what you say, you’re still Ricky too!” Cassidy stalked ever closer. 

“Don’t say that! Don’t lie to me! How could you love me!? Look at me!” he screeched, waving his hands wildly as he gestured to his unkempt hair and old clothes, all the more unkempt and old compared to Cassidy.

“What am I lying about?! I love you! I love Ricky Owens, and I love Mr. E it doesn’t matter which one you are!” 

“You can’t!”

“Why not?” she said, suddenly her voice quieting, “why can I not love you?”

It was about that second when Ricky realized that his face was less than an inch from Cassidy’s, his nose practically touching hers. For a second, this was not two adults screaming because they couldn’t accept their love for each other, instead Ricky saw a 16 year old girl with pink glasses and hair done up in two hair ties, and a 17 year old boy, all limbs and stripes. They were Cassidy Williams and Ricky Owens, and then it was Angel Dynamite, all curly hair and neon green, and Mr. E, with long hair and stripes.

“Is it really so inconceivable,” said Cassidy in a near whisper, “that I love you?”

“I must not be an easy man to love, Angel,” he said, his voice barely audible, “I can’t understand why.”

“I don’t either,” admitted Cassidy, “but I know what I feel,” she brought up her hand slowly, then she brushed it just under his eyes, “and I don’t want to pretend that I don’t anymore.”

Ricky didn’t know who moved first, but wasn’t surprised to find in the next second, Cassidy’s arms wrapped around the back of his neck, tangled in his hair. His arms wrapped around her back and waist, holding her off the ground and held against his body. 

“I never stopped loving you, Cassidy," admitted Ricky, whispered so quietly against Cassidy's neck that it might have just been a breath of air. Cassidy understood him, though.

They stayed like that a very long time.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've had this chapter written for a month but honestly didn't think it was good enough to post. The next chapter will be far superior to this, I'm almost done with it anyway. Sorry for the wait.

Here was something that Ricky had guessed, but never knew for sure; Pericles had been deeply jealous of Cassidy and the time that Ricky spent with her. He had been there the day that they had met. Of course he had, he followed Ricky everywhere, this included school.

It had been a fairly average day. The weather was typical for Crystal Cove, all of the kinder attended lessons, all of them acted as they normally did, one tossed a pencil at the ceiling and gasped when it stuck, the boy proceed to do it several more times, the teacher taught nothing that Pericles, or even Ricky, who was eight years old at the time, didn’t already know. Then the teacher, Mr. Hariot, pulled out a box full of glass beakers and flint and steel.

“Alright children, we’re doing an experiment today!”

Said experiment required the use of a fire striker. A tool which was unfamiliar to Professor Pericles who knew it as a feuerstahl. Pericles watched with annoyance at the substandard and old fashioned flint and steel. 

Ricky fiddled with it, trying to get it to spark. He presses the steel bar down but it just made a rather shrill noise. He tried again, to no avail. He flipped it around to get a better look. Old steel and worn flint clearly wasn’t ideal for this particular situation. Ricky looked at him helplessly. 

“You almost got it,” said a small, high pitched voice. Ricky and Pericles looked over to the girl who happened to be seated next to them that day, she was just a  kleines Mädchen, no older than Ricky. The kleines Mädchen shyly asked “do you need help?” She took the fire striker from Ricky, “here you have to do it this way,” and showed him to press his finger on the outside of the metal so that the metal made contact with the flint when you pressed it. 

Ricky watched her the same way that a cat watches a laser pointer, then took the fire striker back and tried it again. It worked.

“Thank you,” he said cheerily, “what’s your name?”

“I’m Cassidy Williams. You’re Ricky?”

“Yeah, and this is Professor Pericles.”

Pericles pretended he wasn’t annoyed that Cassidy Williams had beat him to explaining the fire striker to Ricky. 

Ricky noticed anyway. He never said a word to Pericles about it.

Ricky rode the bus to school, he did that until he got the Enigma Engine when he was 16, but that was a long way off from 8 and that was the age he was when little Cassidy Williams sat next to him for the first time. Brad and Judy also took the bus, but they sat directly behind Ricky and Pericles.

“Hey Ricky!” said Cassidy as she walked on from her stop.

“Hi Cassidy!” Ricky said happily.

“Can I sit with you?” 

“Yeah.”

“Who are you?” asked Judy, peaking over the seat with Brad right beside her.

“This is Cassidy! She’s super smart, and she likes books and…” 

They made fast friends, which meant that Cassidy would be sticking around. Verdammt.

The kinder were 10 and 9 respectively when they first tried to catch a monster. They failed miserably, because of course they did. They were far too young, too new. The monster was caught not by them but by Pericles, who took off once things began to go south. He returned later to anonymously drop the criminal off on the sheriff's doorstep. 

This event was wholly unimpressive and forgettable to Pericles, however the image of Ricky leaping into Cassidy’s arms burned into his memory like hot iron on flesh.

“You have something on your face.”

“Where?” she asked, her hand coming to her cheek and trying to brush away imaginary dirt.

“No, here,” said Ricky, who was 12 at this point, pointing to his own face, just under his eye, but Cassidy didn’t manage to wipe the dirt away, “here, let me,” he reached out, using his thumb to gently rub the speck of dust or dirt away from her eye, he didn’t seem to realize that his fingers just barely touched the edge of her jaw and cheek. Ricky’s hand jolted back, his face turned a deep shade of red.

There was a word for what Pericles was feeling in that moment. He would never say it. He would deny that he ever felt anything.

Judy tried to set Ricky and Cassidy up on a blind date when Ricky was 16. This was not something that Pericles cared about, it really wasn’t. Ricky could spend as much time with Cassidy as he wanted, it didn’t bother Pericles. It was just that he thought that a romantic relationship might destroy the balance of the group. ‘But aren’t Brad and Judy dating as well?’ Brad and Judy have inferior intellect, and no common sense to speak of, they’re perfect for one another. Ricky and Cassidy were, admittedly, far cleverer. Far more potential to break into a million pieces. 

“My sweet Ricky, I require your assistance.”

“What for?”

“I believe there is something wrong with the roof in the gymnasium of Crystal Cove high school.”

“That sounds like a problem you’ll have to take up with the school.”

“Ah, I think not.”

“What’s wrong with it?” 

“That you will need to see for yourself.”

Ricky followed him because he trusted him, this was a poor choice on his part when Pericles cut the rope ladder that Ricky used to climb to the roof of the high school. 

Ricky screamed, Cassidy heard. Cassidy ran for a ladder and Ricky fell into her arms. 

It didn’t work. 

Pericles watched Ricky silently open his window.

“What do you think that you are doing?” 

“Um, I was just… uh,” Ricky stuttered, he hadn’t noticed Pericles in his haste, clearly his concern was geared towards his parents and not Pericles, “I’m going to Cassidy’s?” 

“I see.”

“I’ll be back soon!”

“I’m sure you will.”

It was just a coincidence that Ricky happened to be spending the night at Cassidy’s house when Pericles met with Fred Jones, the college student. 

Pericles flew to meet Fred Jones as soon as Ricky left. 

Fred Jones offered him an alliance, they just had to get rid of the Kinder first.

For a fleeting moment, he considered that this plan might be one he’d regret, after all, the loyal Kinder were very useful to him. They could help him find the disk.

Ricky,  _ his _ sweet Ricky, was with Cassidy. He had spent more and more time with her as time went on. As time ran out. Thus he spent less and less time with Pericles.

Pericles agreed to an alliance with this Fred Jones. 

‘In hindsight’ Pericles thinks when he wakes up in the animal asylum, ‘there is a word for this and it is  verschlimmbessern.’

  
  


Pericles knew much. He knew more than anyone he had ever or he liked to imagine would ever meet. The smartest bird in the world. He knew that Cassidy, now Angel Dynamite, and ‘Mr. E’ were working together. He knew that before he even broke out of the asylum. He wasn’t surprised when he flew as close as he dared to Cassidy’s radio station and spotted Ricky through the window.

It would not do, however. It would be counterproductive to his plans to have Cassidy close to Ricky. Ricky made his worst choices when he felt isolated, as a child, he had been so desperately lonely that he befriended a talking bird, as an adult, he would do the same if he were lonely enough. Cassidy presented a problem, and a threat, if Ricky had her, Ricky would have no need of Pericles. Pericles had been counting on Ricky being alone, because though he loathed to admit it, he needed Ricky. Ricky had the resources and information that Pericles needed. 

He watched as Ricky and Cassidy screamed at each other, and he hoped. The argument ended with Ricky and Cassidy in each other's arms and his joy abated.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Ihr habt den Weg vom Wurme zum Menschen gemacht, und Vieles ist in euch noch Wurm. Einst wart ihr Affen, und auch jetzt ist der Mensch mehr Affe, als irgend ein Affe." - Friedrich Nietzsche


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OH MY LORD. That took so long for me to write. Sorry for that. Anyway, I wanted to mention that I got a tumblr a while ago, so if anyone wants to ask me for prompts or something you are encouraged to do so, orithereticent is my tumblr username.

While there were things that Cassidy hated about being Angel Dynamite, there were also things that Cassidy loved about being Angel Dynamite. She loved being a DJ. Like any other job, it had it’s good and bad days, but an overall good job. Something she did reluctantly at first but grew to love was DJing at public venues. When she first arrived back in Crystal Cove she had been so afraid that someone would recognize her, that someone would see Cassidy Williams under the mask of Angel Dynamite. No one ever did. Which she should have expected, by that point it had been 15 years and their families had stopped looking. They had been forgotten except by Pericles’s handlers and maybe a brief mention as a cautionary tale.

She was practically the only DJ in town, so she always had a considerable amount of offers to DJ at parties and weddings and such. She took them when they interested her or when she was just bored. 

She woke up early. Cassidy hadn’t planned on that. The curtain was open so Cassidy could see it was still dark out. Cassidy rolled onto her back and yawned, stretching her arms out at the same time. She crawled out of bed, slamming the door on her way out

“Ugh!” came a small grunt from the guest room, Ricky, if he was awake at all, it didn’t matter because he immediately fell back asleep. 

“Sorry, E,” she whispered, he didn’t respond, but that was to be expected.

She was DJing at a wedding on the beach today. The parents of the bride and groom had paid for most of the wedding, except Cassidy had been hired by the groom and the bride. 

So she packed up her equipment and headed to the beach. 

When she arrived she found a tent against a cliff with about 25 people in total, and that included the bride and groom. The bride, a pale woman with extremely dark hair with a purple flower in it, stumbled towards her in her overly poofy white dress with a bag over her shoulder, a frazzled looking man in a suit, and an asian woman in a purple dress with long black hair and dark skin, both paused to catch their breath before speaking.

“You’re the DJ?” the bride said between breaths, she had a light southern accent.

“Yeah, you good, baby?” Cassidy asked her, noting that neither of them could be any older than 20.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine.”

“I haven’t met you yet, what’s your name?”

“Oh, I’m Ada,” she said, a small twitchy smile on her lips, “and this is my maid of honour, Sara and the groom, Isaiah.”

“Congratulations Ada, Isaiah,” said Cassidy as she placed a record and a song began to play, “I’ve got the playlist you requested.”

“Yes, but sadly it seems that Ada’s mother has decided to replace it with her own songs,” said Sara, who had a west country accent, “she wasn’t meant to do that bit.”

“Sara, it’s fine.”

“It is not, my dear Ada, it is not.”

“Ada, your Mom really shouldn’t be doing this sort of thing,” said Isaiah in a small voice.

“You have a different playlist, I take it?” said Cassidy, taking the needle off the record that had been playing.

“Yeah, yeah,” Ada reached into the bag, but Sara handed the paper to Cassidy, “thought I lost it,” 

“It’s quite alright,” Sara replied, resting a hand on Ada’s shoulder. They left quickly back to preparation after that.

Cassidy had liked weddings when she was younger. Flowers, pretty dresses, love. She was older now, older and a little more cynical. She knew that love was much more complicated than a happily ever after, that love often failed. She still secretly liked weddings. So she was a romantic, what of it?

She didn’t like working at weddings, though, because there was always some kind of disaster or fiasco.

It took nearly a whole day of frantic last minute decorating and the arrival of a few more family members and the wedding started as the sun began to go down. The bride wasn’t walking to the traditional wedding song but instead a piano recording of Für Elise. 

Cassidy noticed something. She was a Crystal Cove native, she was used to weird and unusual things happening around her. She was also used to being the only one to think about these occurrences for more than a few seconds. 

“I want to go home before the reception, John,” said a young woman seated next to a young man who from what Cassidy could gather was her boyfriend.

“We can’t, Emily.”

“This wedding is cursed.”

“Don’t be stupid,” the man said with an eye roll.

“No, you don’t understand, grandma said it’s actually cursed, as in, ‘a ghost of our ancestors disapproves and will rise and murder us all’ kind of curse.”

“That’s stupid.”

“You’re stupid.”

“Not as stupid as you.”

“Rude.”

“Anyway, I thought your aunt arranged this whole wedding thing?” 

“Yeah, she did, grandma says that she made a mistake and our families won’t mix.”

A curse wedding, of course. Fiasco.

“Excuse me?” Cassidy turned to find a middle aged woman standing in front of her booth about ten minutes before the ceremony was supposed to start.

“What can I do for you ma’am?” said Cassidy in her best customer service voice. The woman gave her an irate look.

“You’ve not been using my playlist?” she said, pushing her hair behind her ear.

“Look, Ma’am, I was hired by the bride and groom and they gave me the playlist.”

“I paid for the venue.”

“Yes Ma’am, but you didn’t pay for me.”

“I really must insistー”

“Oh for christ's sake, Mary, let it be,” called one of the older members of the audience, “you didn’t pay for music.”

“Yeah, Aunt Mary just shut up,” called a significantly younger family member.

“Hush.”

“Yeah, Aunt Mary, you already cursed the family!”

“Don’t be stupid Emily!”

“Mother,” said Ada, who appeared out of nowhere and began dragging her away from Cassidy, “that’s enough.”

“It’ll be enough when I say it’s enough young lady!” she cried as she left Cassidy’s earshot.

Yeah, she didn’t regret taking this job at all. Cassidy decided at this moment she wouldn’t be doing weddings for a while.

Pretty violets and dyed flowers were thrown around by the mother and Sara. The seats were all taken, the bride’s mother sat at the front. The groom took his position at the altar. He was the only one.

Just when things were settling down and the disruption was forgotten was the moment that everything went south.

Cassidy lowered the needle onto the record, and music began to play. A loud ‘Bang’ made her jump. Cassidy’s eyes darted around the tent for the source of the sound. She found it, a pan, which had contained some fruit had been sent flying by a woman flying into the tent. Not running, as in actually levitating into the room. She had a white, torn dress that looked a thousand years old, but a perfectly intact veil covered her face, the little bit of skin that Cassidy could see was red, blood red. Cassidy, and several other people, covered their ears. Cassidy pressed her headphones to her skull, the sound that was so high pitched it didn’t affect some of the older audience members instantly gave her a headache, almost like the noise of a bat. The woman flew over the heads of the audience, who gaped in horror, shell shocked and frozen. The woman swooped down, jerking the groom into the air. 

“IT WAS MADE CLEAR TO YOU THAT THE ANCESTORS DISAPPROVED, YOU WILL ALL SEE WHAT BECOMES OF THOSE THAT DON”T HEED THE WARNINGS OF THEIR ANCESTORS!” she screamed in a garbled, screechy voice, the groom kicked out desperately, the woman pointed slowly at Ada’s mother, “YOU HAVE TWELVE HOURS TO CALL OFF THE WEDDING, OR, YOU’LL NEVER SEE THE PRECIOUS GROOM AGAIN!” The woman flew through the roof of the tent, Cassidy finally came to her senses as she threw DVDs at the reatreting figures back. She dogged, crashing into a pole which made a metallic thump. It made no difference because she and the groom had disappeared.

  
  
  


“You can’t just ignore a kidnapping!” screamed the distraught mother of the groom. Someone who had clearly never been to Crystal Cove before called the police. Yeah, helpful. 

“I can if it’s a ghost bride,” said the Sheriff, “ghosts aren’t under my jurisdiction.”

“Besides, the undead operated on a different level of morality,” offered the Mayor cheerfully. He had definitely already started planning merchandise, “Say, ghost bride would look good on a t-shirt.”

“I’ll draw up some concept art.”

Cassidy sighed. She unlocked her phone and found Velma’s number, which she called. It rung, and rung… and rung. Velma didn’t answer. She hit Fred’s number. Nothing. Daphne? Nope. Shaggy and Scooby? Null. 

She clicked a different contact. This time the phone didn’t even ring.

“What is it, Angel?” Ricky answered, she heard the whirl of monitors in the background.

“I found a case for the kids,” she said, kicking at the sea water, “but they aren’t picking up.”

“Let’s see,” Ricky went silent for a moment, keys clanking, “they’re occupied.”

“With what?”

“Vincent Van Ghoul.”

“Wha- okay nevermind, will they be able to investigate this case?”

“Probably, but it’d take them a few days to get to it.”

“Won’t work.”

“Time sensitive?” he asked, papers shuffling.

“Yeah, a ghost bride kidnapped the groom from a cursed wedding. 12 hour time limit.” 

She heard nothing but Ricky’s quiet footsteps on metal for a few seconds, “You want to investigate?” 

“It’s not like I have anything better to do today, plus the groom is paying me.”

“...Send me the address, I’ll be there presently.”

Cassidy, after quickly texting Ricky the address. After idling for a half an hour while she tried to fix the disks she had thrown, waited for Ricky, and watched the family members frantically search then give up and start gossiping, she walked over to where the tent had been torn. She ran a finger down the fabric, loose threads catching on her nail. Just normal fabric. The pole that the ghost woman had run into was more interesting to Cassidy. She used a folding chair to get a better look at the damage. The metal was dented sharply, little indentations, not the way a body dents metal, the way a piece of metal dents metal.

“What are you doing?” Cassidy looked to her left to see Sara, the maid of honour,walking towards her, “you  _ do _ know you can leave?”

“I’m just curious by nature.”

“There is not much to be curious about.”

“Say, Sara, you know about the cursed wedding thing, what’s that about?”

“I only know the cliff notes, just that Ada’s grandmother disapproved of this marriage, and that she fancies herself to be something of a spirit medium,” Sara replied, “Angel, you should go, I know Ada’s family, they won’t go on with the wedding.”

“I will, eventually.”

“There is quite literally no point in you being here.”

“I want to take a look around first.”

“For what exactly?”

“Well, look here,” Cassidy said pointing, “you see how this pole is bent?”

“Yes, we all saw the ghost hit the pole.”

“Doesn’t that strike you as odd?”

“Not really, no, look, if you want to stick around whatever, but I wouldn’t count on there being a wedding today,” Sara replied, shaking her head as she did.

“Is the grandmother here?”

“Yes, she’s here, why?”

“Why’s she at a wedding she doesn’t approve of?”

“Ask Ada’s grandmother?” she stalked off without another word. 

“She was friendly,” interrupted Ricky, which made Cassidy jump. He had just appeared out of nowhere. He stood under the pole staring up at it. 

“I mean her friend was kidnapped, I can’t say I blame her.”

“What’s wrong with the pole?” he asked flatly.

“Look at it,” she replied, pointing at the dent as she did.

“I can’t see the pole very well.”

“You need glasses.” 

Ricky squinted at the pole and didn’t answer her.

“The metals dented weirdly, metal doesn’t dent like that when a body hits it,” Cassidy supplied, “but metal on metal does. Not a real ghost.”

“It never is.”

“Question is who’s pretending to be a ghost?”

“Well, who would want to stop the wedding?”

“I’ve got an idea.”

Cassidy spun around and walked away, Ricky put his hands in his jacket pockets and did the same, Cassidy searched around, bumping into a random wedding goer as she did, the question of where Ada’s grandmother was was quickly solved, the woman made it very obvious from the get go. She was standing next to the sea, a little bit away from everyone else dressed in a black dress and clutching a cane with a decorative glass ball on the top. 

“Ma’am? Are you Ada’s grandmother?”

“I am, I am. I am named Leah, you are the DJ,” she said without looking away from the sea, “and the spirits are angry.”

“We just wanted to ask you about the whole ghost kidnapping thing?” said Cassidy.

“The spirits are angry,” was all she said in response, Cassidy decided a different tactic.

“Why are the spirits angry, Leah?” 

“Ada is not supposed to marry Isaiah, she is not, they know, they know that she is not destined to marry him.”

Cassidy looked at Ricky cautiously, really not sure how to approach this woman. Then Leah suddenly turned from the ocean, head jerking around first, then her body following.

“your friend is not supposed to be here! The spirits don’t want him here.”

Ricky stepped backwards away from her. It didn’t make a difference because she turned to stare at the sea, “I will speak of it no more, I warned her already, I have no interest in gloating, no, no interest.”

The green water glittered in the moonlight, the sun was long gone.

  
  


The woman wouldn’t speak to them after that. 

“I don’t think it’s her, no way,” stated Cassidy as they walked away from Leah, “she’d never be able to carry Isaiah.”

“No, probably not,” agreed Ricky, “who else would want to stop the wedding?”

“Wellー” a whistling noise interrupted Cassidy, it was getting louder, ‘almost like’ Cassidy thought slightly confused, then ‘… oh.’ Cassidy dropped to the ground and rolled, and something just barely soared over her head. It crashed into the ground with an explosion of sand. Ricky cursed loudly, he kicked up more sand as he jumped back. 

“Are you alright?” asked Ricky. Cassidy got back to her feet. Wet sand stuck to her green pants, she tried to brush it off but it just scratched her hand like sandpaper. 

“I’m fine,” Cassidy replied. Ricky was also covered in sand. It stuck on his shoes like dust to an old bookshelf. 

They cautiously approached the object, It was a box. Cassidy picked it up, it was made of smooth, cold metal and moderately heavy. Not enough to kill her if it had hit her but certainly enough to knock her out. Cassidy stared at the sky to see where it had come from. . Cassidy opened the box slowly as she held it away from her body. A purple object fell out, then a second purple object. Cassidy opened the box fully.

“Flowers?” said Ricky, plucking one from the box. He spun the stem between his fingers, “these are violets.”

“There’s a letter,” said Cassidy, pulling the neatly folded paper out of the box, “‘heed the flowers, they are the answer you seek. Don’t meddle where you have no business and where you don’t want too.’”

“Heed the violets…”

“Miss?” said a neutral sounding southern accented voice. Cassidy glanced up to see Ada standing before her, “Sara told me that you were here.”

“Don’t worry Baby, I won’t charge for overtime,” joked Cassidy, she put her free hand on her hip.

Ada chuckled, “that’s kind of you, Miss, but I was gonna say that you can get going.”

“Sara told me the same thing, look, I’ll leave soon, I just wanted to take a look around first.”

“That’s okay, I was just giving you the option,” replied Ada, then she sighed, “oh, another thing, watch out for that one bloke in the tie and the officer, they’re still here, they’ve been lurking.”

“The Mayor?” interrupted Ricky incredulously. 

For half a second Ada blinked at him with slightly widened eyes, then her expression returned to normal, “Er, yes, I think so, they’re trying to get a look at the ‘ghost bride’, they said something about T-shirts?”

“Yeah, that’s the Mayor for you.”

“Wait, so that really is the sheriff and the mayor?” asked Ada in shock. Cassidy and Ricky nodded. “Okay, that’s really bad, but anyway, unless you wanna be questioned on what the ghost looked like, don’t talk to them.” 

“I’m really sorry about Isaiah, by the way.”

“Oh, he’ll be fine, he’s clever, good at handling himself.” 

Just then, a woman yelled something, Ada turned her head violently, then she started sprinting in the opposite direction.

“Get back here, young lady!” cried Ada’s mother angrily, but Ada was already gone.

But a moment Ada’s mother began to charge after Ada, something else happened. Another, louder voice spoke up.

“YOU ARE STILL HERE!” cried the ghost, standing on the tent, addressing the idling family members. More specifically, she was staring at Ada’s mother.

“See John! I told you we should have left!”

“Stop being stupid Emily!”

“SILENCE!” the ghost screeched, then she swooped down, reaching out and knocking hats off heads and swiping at people as she did. Family members screamed and ran in every direction. She pulled the hat off of Ada’s mother’s head. Knocking her down roughly.

“THIS UNION HAS BEEN CURSED YOU WERE WARNED!”

Ricky and Cassidy’s eyes met, and they said the exact same thing at the exact same time, “Run!” and that’s what they did, they turned and ran so fast that they left sand flying in their wake.

“IT HAS BEEN THREE HOURS! HEED THE WARNING! THIS WILL BE A POOR UNION! AND I WILL STOP IT AT ANY COST!” Then she swooped low enough that sand kicked up. The next breath that Cassidy took choked her and her eyes squeezed shut. She collided with Ricky, or at least she assumed it was Ricky, he tripped over Cassidy and fell. Then she curled in on herself and allowed herself to fall, covering her head as she did.

The sand cloud cleared. Leaving half-blind coughing guests. Cassidy blinked to clear her eyes, coughing violently as she did.

Ricky, still right next to her, was so covered in sand that his dark hair looked white. His face fixed in a grimace. 

“Let-Let’s get..” Cassidy tried to speak between coughs, it wasn’t working. Ricky shook his head. After a few moments of coughing up sand, Cassidy tried again, “I need some water.”

“Please.”

  
  
  


“Jeez, was your family like this?” asked Cassidy from the rock she was resting on, she took a drink of her water.

“Like what?” asked Ricky, from his respective rock.

“You know, all this infighting, that girl running away from her mother all that.”

“Have you ever been to a family reunion? That’s what always happens.”

“Nah, my parents didn’t really have any extended family.”

“Didn’t you go to one of mine?”

“No I…” Cassidy paused, searching her memory, “wait, yes I did, we were just kids.”

“My parents didn’t want the rest of my family to meet Pericles.”

“Oh, so I was covering for Pericles that day.”

“You did a good job.”

“Thank you, I love being a good bird replacement,” snorted Cassidy, “we should look for clues.”

They wordlessly stood, searching around the beach in front of the tent, then inside, they found nothing. Then as Cassidy was leaving the tent she spotted something in her peripheral vision. The tent, which was tied against a cliff, had a mallet missing from it, leaving space behind the tent. She would’ve chalked this up to the mallet falling out, but she noticed that some of the wire that was in this vacant space led to the top of the cliff, which was about ten feet up from the top of the tent. 

“hold up, that’s really weird,” she said to herself, she climbed behind the small space between the tent and the cliff. The cliff was jagged, but a few thick metal wires ran down into a pulley which was attached to a harness.

“What’s weird?” Ricky called. 

“There’s a pulley back here!” she called back, “guess that’s how the ghost girl flew.”

“I think we know who it is.”

“Yeah, the violets.”

“Yes, that, you noticed it?”

“Yes I did.”

“The ghost is going after Ada’s mom.”

“Good, we have live bait.”

They found some inflatable pool toys and put them in a barrel. Then Ricky peeked his head around the tent, all of the plastic folding chairs were empty. 

Cassidy walked around slowly, til she found Ada’s mother. She scowled when Cassidy approached.

“Ma’am?”

“What do you want!” she said sharply, “we aren’t paying you for sticking around.”

“No, I wanted to go over some details of the playlist.”

She got a small glitter in her eye, a smug smile across her face, “very well, let’s see.”

Cassidy led her towards the cliff, sand seemed to stick to her shoes, as if weighing her down.

Ricky, hidden behind Cassidy’s DJ equipment, watched a shadow dart to the back of the tent, lifting the fabric and stepping out. Ricky remained silent.

“... so due to the circumstances, I’ll make this gig 50% off.”

“That’s very kind of you.”

The figure shot up into the air. Ricky ran and pulled the fabric of the tent up.

Cassidy and Ada’s mother heard a shriek, when they looked around, the ghost girl swooped down at them. Cassidy grabbed Ada’s mother’s hand, pulling her closer to the cliff. They ducked as the woman swooped too close. Cassidy pulled the screaming women closer to the cliff. She watched the ghost make to swoop down again.

“Now!”

Ricky used some of Cassidy’s sharp disks to swing wildly at the metal wire. It snapped.

“AHHH!”

With a crash, the woman fell into the pool toys.

Cassidy ran over, along with Ricky, Ada’s mother, on the other hand, ran away, along with most of the family. 

Cassidy stepped forward and pulled the mask off of the ghost's face. A dark skinned asain woman stared back at them.

“Sara?” said a quiet voice, Ada’s voice. She had snuck behind them, “why?”

“Because we can’t keep doing everything our parents ask of us,” said a different voice, Isaiah, he approached carefully.

“Because I love you too much to see you marry someone you don’t love for your parents sake,” replied Sara, she stood, Cassidy helped her free herself from the pool toys.

“Sara.”

“Don’t pretend that it didn’t happen, I know you love me too.”

“What about Isaiah?” asked Ada, “I love him.”

“Ada, we’ve been friends for years, you know I love you, just not like that, and I think that it’s the same for you,” replied Isaiah, “that’s why we did this.”

“You guys planned this?” 

“We had to,” pleaded Sara, “you’re mother would have never listened to reason.”

“We set up the pulley system behind the tent weeks ago.”

“That's how you kids flew?” interrupted Cassidy.

“That’s right,” said Isaiah

“Sara, I’m sorry but we can’t, we just can’t, my parents will never speak to me again.”

“And will you be able to live unsatisfied and unloved?” argued Sara, she reached out slowly to Ada, and Ada fell into her arms.

“Our parentsー”

“Don’t need to know,” interrupted Ricky, “we didn’t see anything.”

“We can’t just live in secret,” Ada lamented tearfully, “my parents will try to force me to get married again!”

“You’re over 18, right?” asked Cassidy, Ada nodded, “you don’t have to do what your parents say, and is it really worth it to live unfaithful to yourself for the conditional love of someone else?”

“Ada, she’s right, please, please stop listening to your parents, they don’t have your best interest at heart,” Isaiah said softly, he gently patted her on the shoulder. 

Ada, still tearful, laughed sadly, she kissed Sara on the cheek, and whispered something in her ear.

“How did you know?” asked Sara, she turned her head to Cassidy.

“A couple of things, the first is that you weren’t in the room when the ghost attacked, the second was the violets, we looked that clue up, we found it on a website dedicated to symbols of LGBT+, then the pulley system showed us how you flew.”

“Isaiah!” and in an instant, Isaiah’s entire family surrounded him, joyful at his return, “what happened?”

“The ghost let me go,” he lied, “on the condition that I don’t marry Ada.”

“Of course!” 

“We should have listened to that old lady.”

“Don’t marry Ada!”

“What!” cried Ada’s mother, “but they ー”

“No!” came the collective cries of everyone at the wedding. She sank back in defeat, knowing full well she couldn’t fight everyone at the wedding.

Cassidy and Ricky didn’t stick around to see how the situation resolved itself,

“I’ll bring around the enigma engine if you pack up your equipment.”

“Sounds good.”

She crept around the outside of the tent and into it. She had just finished packing when she heard a voice.

“Dancing manatees, is that you, Angel Dynamite?” asked the Mayor, who had been mingling with the rest of the family for a while. He smiled much the same way a car salesman smiles when they try and convince you that they are trustworthy.

“Yeah, hey, Mayor Jones.”

“You saw the ghost girl?”

“I did.”

“Could you describe it to me? I’m trying to make merchandise!” 

“I’d like to, Mayor Jones, but I’ve gotta get going, my ride’s here,” she said, dragging her equipment as quickly as possible to the stairs that lead to the landing that Ricky was waiting for her at. She practically threw her equipment into the back of the van.

Unknown to Ricky and Cassidy, the Mayor’s smile faded into wide eyes the moment he spotted the van driving away.


End file.
